


The Smell of Leather

by Caenea



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: And he gets over it very quickly, BASE Jumping, Bare Knuckle Fights, Because he wants to bone, Drinking, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Extreme Sports, F/M, Gendry does have a bit of a chip on his shoulder, It's kind of justified, Motorbikes, POV Alternating, Parkour, Petyr/Sansa is background, Pod and Arya bang, Recreational Drug Use, Sansa and Arya actually have a good sisterly relationship, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Smoking, Tattoos, friends with benefits relationship, just be aware of that
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-15 01:41:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 24,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14781218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caenea/pseuds/Caenea
Summary: Arya Stark and Gendry Waters come from very different backgrounds – Arya’s rich, heiress to a country estate, she actually has a title. Gendry grew up in the bad end of the big city, no parents, no money and no title beyond his name. But for all that, they have four things in common before they’ve ever met: a love of leather, a hatred for their names, a passion for dangerous sports and nicknames based on their tattoos. They’ve yet to meet, despite the intimacy of their immediate circles, but stories of the Bull reach the ears of the Faceless and vice versa. They each craft opinions of each other, and neither are exactly complimentary – she thinks he sounds like a typical Angry Young Man and he thinks she sounds like a Spoilt Little Rich Girl. But when they finally meet at a dive bar in Flea Bottom, they’re both at the top of their games – Arya in parkour and base jumping and Gendry in street racing and bare-knuckle fights – and the whole world watches as they clash. After all, it can all only go wrong – right? Wrong. Arya falls in lust, Gendry falls in love and somewhere in the mix they meet her family, his friends and organise an Extreme Sports Olympiad.





	1. Gendry I

**Author's Note:**

> This will not be a long story and nor will it be angsty. It will feature smut, lemons, gratuitous (consensual) violence, excessive leather, Arya and Gendry on motorbikes, Arya and Gendry with a whole heap of tattoos between them. It is (perhaps obviously) a modern day AU. Full roll of Stark kids exists, with the ages as follows: Robb (23), Jon (23), Sansa (21), Arya (19), Bran (16) and Rickon (13). Drinking age of 18, so Arya’s legal (just) and Gendry’s a few years older than her at 25.

                “Well, fuck me with a rusty fucking hammer,” the voice boomed, and Gendry looks up from the sink to see Beric wending his way through the scrum in the gym. With Gendry and his opponent trying to wind down post-fight and the local rugby team trying to get ready for their match, the tiny changing room is packed solid. Beric appearing causes more than a few grumbles. “Excellent fight mate,” Beric says, cheerfully oblivious to all this as he reaches Gendry and pulls him into a rough, one-armed, back-slapping hug. Gendry grins when he turns back to the sink.

                “Cheers mate,” he answers, washing his face. The water is tinged pink with his blood, and Gendry glances in the mirror to poke at the split in his lip. Ah well, he’s had worse. He shuts off the water and steps away to his bag, fishing out shower gear and soap, now the rugby team have clattered off outside. Beric takes a seat on the bench and waits.

 

By the time Gendry’s back out, the kid he’d fought has long gone. Licking his wounds probably. Gendry can’t even remember his name. He’s got no qualms about stripping down in front of Beric, who has seen it all before and didn’t give much of a shit the first time.

                “What else does today bring?” Beric asks, as Gendry towels off and dresses.

                “New tattoo,” Gendry says, his voice muffled by his jumper as he manipulates it over his head to avoid his battered lip.

                “Seeing Thoros?” Beric asks, almost casually.

                “No,” Gendry says, smirking. “Sadly not, so there’s no need for you to hang around to flirt. My appointment is with Mya, actually.”

                “Ah well, fuck it then. You going to be in Blackwater later?”

                “Yeah, probably.”

                “Well we’re starting there – Staggered Pony I think – then going into Flea Bottom to see a band – Wildfire, apparently they’re pretty good.”

                “Text me,” Gendry says vaguely. “Who’s we, anyway?” he asks, packing up his bag.

                “Usual crowd – me, Anguy, Thoros.”

                “Might come.”

                “Alright.”

 

Gendry’s new tattoo takes ninety minutes, and Mya joshes him the whole way through about his banged up face. She was the one who nicknamed him Bull, because his first piece had been a three-hour pain festival of a half-sleeve, that featured a bull’s head as the central piece. She’d only been Thoros’ apprentice then, a vibrant seventeen year old who had more energy than sense. She still had buckets of both, but they were a little more in balance now. She puts the final line in and straightens up, wiping down his ribs and admiring her own handiwork.

                “If you get any more ravens on you, we’ll have to change your name,” she comments. “You can take a look before I dress it, if you want.” He duly admires it in the mirror, the sweep of the wings wrapping onto chest and back, the bird perched on a branch that followed the line of his bottom rib. Christ, that had hurt.

                “It’s great,” he says, turning back to her for dressing. She wipes it over again and tapes the square of clingfilm over it.

                “Keep that on for at least an hour, preferably a couple,” she instructs, as he repositions his shirt and pulls his jumper back on.

                “Not my first rodeo,” he points out.

                “No, but I’ll tell you anyway. Cream twice a day at least. You can pay Thoros while I clean up in here.” Gendry brushes a kiss to her cheek and goes outside. Thoros is sitting at the desk, pouring over an account book. Gendry pays him, makes the same vague promise about tonight that he made to Beric, then heads back to his flat. The office job he hates so much pays just enough for him to rent somewhere that isn’t Flea Bottom, and he lives in the slightly nicer Blackwater Bay. Only very slightly, admittedly, but still it’s home. There’s some kind of fuss going on though, as he walks homewards, through the city streets. They’re busier than ever. He frowns, not remembering an event being mentioned. Suddenly, a shadow passes over him, and he looks up in time to see a girl leap from the building above him. There are scattered screams, but the girl is flipping round and round in a ball, landing so neatly on the rooftop to the right of the narrow street, before she’s up with a whoop and dancing over the rooftops, jump by jump and she’s gone, as suddenly as she came. Gendry shakes his head and carries on walking. Mad woman, whoever she was. It did look fun though, the way she’d nearly flown, landed so neatly. She had also appeared to be alone. Very few people did parkour alone, for good reason. It was dangerous; it could go wrong so easily. Still, if she had splattered herself all over the Street of Sisters, plenty of people would have seen it. If she had survived the drop, help would surely have been forthcoming.

 

Home was a tiny, tiny flat over a newsagents. Gendry called in for beer and smokes before he opened his narrow little front door and went up his narrow stairs. The flat itself was nice enough, he thought, although it was a ballache having to trail up and down stairs when someone rang his doorbell. The paper was in; he’d scooped it up from the doormat. He only kept getting it for the sake of the puzzles in the back really. But today the headline caught his eye – that the Stark family, the last remaining nobility in the North, really – were in Kings Landing for the annual celebration of the King’s birthday. The royal family weren’t something that really bothered Gendry, on the very edges of the city. Royals were royals, and not uncommonly a creature as exotic as the giants they used to claim existed if you went far North enough. The big picture had a gleeful caption stating that the younger Lady Stark wasn’t pictured and speculated on her continued absence from public life. Gendry rolled his eyes, and turned to the crossword.

 

Beric phoned up at five, and managed to pester him into agreeing to the night out after all. Gendry said he would eat first, and Beric replied he would bring over a pizza and they could have a few beers together first. Gendry gave it all up as a bad job, agreed to Beric coming over, and devoted a whole five minutes to having a vague tidy up of his flat. He wasn’t the messiest of men, but neither was he obsessive about cleanliness.

 

Beric was bursting with news, even as Gendry let him in.

                “I’ve got some information you might like to know,” he said gleefully, before Gendry had even started going up the stairs.

                “Have you really.”

                “Yes, so don’t get miserable on me,” Beric says firmly. “Faceless is back.” Gendry rolls his eyes so hard he thinks he might have actually pulled a muscle.

                “I told you last time she was apparently in the city, and I’ll tell you this time – I don’t care.”

                “Ah yes, I keep forgetting that you haven’t met her. I met her last year when she popped up, in a bar. She was fun.”

                “Fun,” Gendry says, flatly.

                “Surprisingly so.”

                “For a spoilt little rich girl who has nothing better to do than rebel against her daddy, you mean.”

 

The girl everyone persists in calling Faceless is supposedly as wild and as reckless as Gendry himself is, except she goes in for base jumping instead of bare-knuckle boxing. She appears in Kings Landing maybe two or three times a year, but every time she returns, the whispers start up. Like Gendry, the nickname comes from her tattoos – apparently, none of them have faces. Frankly Gendry just finds that weird. Unlike Gendry, she’s apparently staggeringly, appallingly wealthy – or her father is, anyway. Rumour has it that she even has a title, although nobody seems whether that bit is true or not.

 

Either way, Gendry doesn’t need or want to meet such a girl. His thoughts, oddly, still stray back to the parkour girl from earlier, and instead of letting Beric get all het up about Faceless, he instead brings up that girl instead. It works. It keeps Beric quiet until they reach _The Staggered Pony,_ the pub that overlooks Blackwater Bay itself, where Gendry uses sheer size to get them all a booth. It’s as hectic as ever, but the barmen know all of them, and soon enough Beric and Thoros return clutching a pitcher of beer each and four glasses.

 

Anguy spots her first and nudges Beric. Gendry looks too, following the motions of his jerking head to the door, which has just opened. A tiny body, in tight leather trousers, shoulder-length brown hair. She’s wearing a blue motorcycle jacket, flung open to show a skin-tight black shirt. She’s standing there, dripping confidence, accompanied by a couple of older guys, one in a red motorcycle jacket and one in a grey one. All three are complete strangers to Gendry, but obviously not to the girl. The older one in the grey jacket is standing slightly apart, stance wide and stare defensive. The younger one puts on no such air. He has his arm slung over the girl’s slim shoulders, and before Gendry has fully realised what has happened, Beric has slid out of the booth and is pushing his way towards them.

 

And so Gendry finds himself sitting opposite the smallest woman he’s ever seen, so short her feet don’t touch the floor when she sits right back in the booth’s seating and so slim she seems almost insubstantial at first glance. Peeking out of the shirt is a wolf’s head tattoo. And then it’s her eyes he sees, as they meet his full of mischief and then surprise as they both speak together.

                “It’s you!”


	2. Arya I

The wind was whipping at her hair, finding the two loose strands that hadn’t made it into the bun as she stood above the teeming Street of Sister’s in King’s Landing. She’d arrived this morning, with the family of course, but the first second she got she’d snuck away. Now she was ready and confident nobody would recognise her. Not that _she_ particularly cared if she was, but her mother would go wild if she found out what Arya did in her free time. She’d probably lock her in a tower until she was thirty. She bounced lightly on the balls of her feet – and then took a running jump straight over the side. She landed with a whoop and a roll on the rooftop at the other side of the street and heard the few screams die out. She was off in a heartbeat, leaping from roof to roof, her heart pounding. When she made it down to the Bay, she stopped, heart hammering in her chest and sweat pouring off her. Over the water, far away at the other end of the city, the Red Keep rose high and stern. Arya turned her back on it with a grimace, hating the physical reminder of who she really was.

 

Ayra despised nothing more than official state business. When she was thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, her mother would force her to attend certain banquets and events and charity galas and the Gods knew what else. She would have to curtsey and hold bland, boring conversations about absolutely nothing, while smiling and waving and being photographed. The minute she had turned sixteen, she had gone to her father. Robb, Jon and Sansa had been sent away to the schools of their choosing at sixteen – Robb to the Iron Islands to join the Kings Naval Forces, Jon to the Watch, the exclusive military school, and Sansa to the Sept of Baelor to study the “gentle arts”, whatever the fuck that might be – and now she too took advantage of it. She demanded to be sent to Braavos, to receive a practical education in mechanics, engineering and the sciences. Her mother had nearly had a fit when she’d been told the news, but it was too late – she had her father’s consent. She’d left three days later.

 

The only deal she’d been forced to make was that she would return at least three times a year – for her father’s birthday, her mother’s birthday, and the annual celebration of the King’s birthday. She had agreed.

 

Three years of glorious bliss, where nobody gave a damn about Lady Stark and the ‘proper behaviour’. She hadn’t just learnt to fix bikes and cars and engines whilst she was in Braavos. She’d met Jaqen while she was over there. He’d taught her a hell of a lot more than how to get an engine going again. He’d taught her how to get her own engine running. He’d shown her parkour and BASE jumping, and she’d revelled in it, taking to it like a duck to water. They called her the Water Dancer for a while, back in Braavos, because apparently when she threw herself off buildings and cliffs and rooftops she was extremely graceful. He’d taught her more too, and she smirked when she remembered those _other_ lessons.

 

This afternoon had been a huge risk. She’d felt so trapped, so utterly, utterly useless at the Keep. Sansa of course had been the very centre of attention – twenty-one, absolutely gorgeous, graceful, elegant, polite, ladylike – everything Arya wasn’t. Not that Arya wanted any of that. She’d greeted the King and Queen and then, when she was sent to wash and change, she’d sneaked out of the Keep. She’d catch it later, but it was worth it for these hours of stolen freedom.

 

It was Sandor who found her, still on the roof, with Pod, her father’s equerry. Both of them grinned at her as she dropped down.

                “Suppose I have to go back?” she said, glumly.

                “Nope,” Sandor said, grinning. “Your mother is not happy, that’s for certain, but your father has said that as long as you are home by midnight, you’re free.” Arya beamed. She could do that.

                “We brought your bike,” Pod added. “And found a couple of bars.”

 

Perfect. She threw open the door to _The Staggered Pony_ and walked in, breathing in the scent of stale beer and sweat and that _bar_ smell. Wonderful. There was a shout of “Faceless!” and she turned to see Beric pushing towards her through the crowd. They’d met last year, when she’d managed to wheedle her father into giving her permission to go out into the city. She and Beric had spent a whole night drinking and dancing and laughing. He’d written to her a few times too. She grinned at the sight of him, accepted his hug.

                “We’ve got a booth, you want to join us?”

                “Who’s us?” she asks, following him anyway. Sandor stayed by the bar, but Pod came with her. She slid into the booth, opposite an oddly familiar man.

 

Then he looked up and their eyes met and she saw her own surprise mirrored.

                “It’s you!” he said, at the same time as her own exclamation. Beric looked between them, frowning.

                “I thought you said you didn’t know her?” The guy frowned, confused. “Faceless?” Beric elaborated.

                “You’re Faceless?” he demanded.

                “That’s what they call me,” Arya answered, baffled now. “We’ve met though, haven’t we? Years ago?” She’d been a skinny little thirteen year old back then. Oh Gods, what the hell was his name?

                “Yeah,” he answered, staring hard at her. “At Harrenhal.” That was it, she’d been there visiting some deadly dull old man who later transpired to be the Queen’s father. Her mother had been trying to find her to force her into attending the formal dinner, and Arya had run off to the woods. She’d come across this boy – man now – shirtless and sweaty, lugging around boxes of stuff. They’d messed around together, holding a mock sword-fight with sticks before her mother had found her and dragged her back to boredom. She hoped and prayed he had the sense to keep his mouth shut. The last thing she needed was to be outed as the younger Lady Stark.

                “What were you both doing at Harranhal?” Beric asked her, and she thought fast.

                “My mother knew someone in the village there,” she lied smoothly.

                “Lugging boxes,” the man grunted, obviously seeing the lie but not outing it. Pod kept it shut too, thank the Gods.

                “Gendry, beer?” one of the other men in the booth said then, holding up the pitcher they had. _Gendry_ , that was it. Gendry accepted.

                “Arya, can we get you a drink?” Beric asked, rubbing his hands together.

                “Sandor’s probably doing that,” she answered, gesturing vaguely at the bar. As if on cue, he came stumping over, so physically huge he blocked what little light there was. He slid a beer in front of Pod, and a cider in front of her. She grinned up at him, and hoped he would recognise the broad hint. “Join us,” she said. “Don’t hulk there like you’re guarding me.” As much as people might claim that Sandor was more brawn than brain, he was smart enough on the uptake for Arya. He found a chair and pulled it up, sitting down heavily.

                “We’re having a few drinks here, then going into Flea Bottom,” Beric said. “Bull here knows a bar.” Arya’s eyes swivelled to him.

                “Wait, you’re the Bull?”

 

She’d heard of him, of course she had. He was a bare-knuckle fighter, and an occasional street racer. When she came to Kings Landing and sought out her freedom in the bars and clubs that littered the bottom end of the city, she’d always hear about him, although up until now, their paths had never crossed. Beric was looking between them now with undisguised glee.

                “You’ve heard of him, then?” Arya snorted.

                “What are you, his promoter? You told me about him yourself last year.”

                “So I did. I’ve told him about you too,” Beric said, giving her a positively lecherous wink. Arya rolled her eyes and made a gesture her mother most definitely would have disapproved of.

                “Referring to me as Faceless, apparently,” she said. “Gods, _one_ tattoo doesn’t have a face and all of a sudden you’re weird.”

                “Got any new ones since last we met?” Beric asked, grinning. He was getting closer and closer to her too. She couldn’t help but notice Gendry flicking glances at the closing gap.

                “Two, actually.”

                “Show me.”

                “You’re a bad man, Beric Dondarrion,” she answered, laughing. “What if they’re on my arse?”

                “Then you’ll definitely have to show me.”

                “We should get off,” Gendry said abruptly, standing up. “Wildfire start at eight.” Arya blinked at the interruption. It was almost like he was jealous.

 

He grabbed her arm when they got outside. Sandor hovered, but she waved him away. Pod too, leaving her to walk slightly behind the others with Gendry.

                “What’s your problem?” she demanded.

                “Does he know? Who you really are, I mean?” She glared at him.

                “No he doesn’t – and don’t you dare tell him.” Gendry’s nostril’s flared slightly.

                “Going incognito, are we?”

                “Yes,” she snapped. “Problem?”

                “Not at all. Just wanted to be sure we were on the same page.” He stalked ahead then, or would have done if she hadn’t grabbed his arm.

                “What’s your problem anyway?” she asked, rather irritated by his manner.

                “Me? No problem. My lady.”

                “Do not call me my Lady!” she said.

                “But that is what you are,” he pointed out. “As your mother made very clear to me at Harranhal. What was it she said? Ah yes, that you shouldn’t be associating with the riff-raff.” Arya felt herself colour at the snub.

                “I am not my mother.”

                “No,” he agreed, voice still tight. “I doubt Lady Catelyn would be seen dead slumming it with the likes of me – although apparently you like a bit of slumming.”

                “If you are referring to Beric,” she said, her voice low with anger, “then you can go and fuck yourself with a hammer. What I do isn’t your business and it certainly isn’t your place to judge me on it.”

                “I don’t like people who think drinking with the lower classes is a bit of fun on a jolly night out,” he said, mocking the accent she tried so hard to keep out of her voice.

                “That’s what you think this is?” she snapped, catching his arm again and forcing him to stop. “That’s what you think of me?”

                “The rebellious little rich girl? Certainly.”

                “Sandor!” Arya suddenly shouted, turning her head towards the retreating group.

                “Calling the bodyguard?” Gendry said, and there was no longer any attempt to hide the contempt in his tones. Sandor reached them then, and behind him, Arya could see the whole group had stopped. She ignored Gendry and turned to face Sandor.

                “Sandor, I’m going to a different bar, right? You and Pod meet me back at _The Staggered Pony_ at half-eleven.”

                “Fine,” Sandor said. “Call if you need anything.” He returned to the original group, who eventually walked on, although Beric was glancing back. She turned back to Gendry.

                “Come with me,” she said, then turned on her heel without waiting to see if he’d follow. She was fairly sure he would.


	3. Gendry II

She’d sent her bodyguard away, sent everyone away. She’d just assumed Gendry would obey her, follow her like a faithful dog. He had half a mind to just let her bugger off, before he realised he was already following her. She walked them back to _The Staggered Pony_ and stopped in front of a motorcycle. It was old, well-broken in and the blue of it matched her jacket. She swung a leg over the seat and turned to him.

                “Get on,” she said.

                “Are you mad?” he demanded, staring at her. What the hell was up with her? He had to admit, this was not the skinny, undersized little brat he’d met at Harrenhal five years ago. While she was still small, Gendry could tell it wasn’t a fragile smallness. There was power in those legs that looked so long and tight in the leathers, and when she’d shrugged out of her jacket in the bar, he could tell she was fit and toned.

                “Get on the damn bike,” she repeated, and he huffed. And yet – there he was, climbing on. She didn’t have a helmet and he didn’t like to ask. She kickstarted the bike and Gendry could feel the raw power of it under his legs and arse. “Hold onto my waist, or you’ll be a smear on the road,” she instructed. He obeyed.

 

She drove them out of the city, through the Iron Gate, and up the Rosby Road a little way. She pulled off at a little turning, little more than a track, and drove down, down, down. She stopped the bike in a little clearing, and Gendry realised that they were looking out over the Blackwater Bay. She put the kick stand down when she got off the bike, and walked towards the cliff. He followed her, vaguely alarmed.

                “So, any particular reason for the abduction?” he asked, irritated with himself. Why had he followed her so easily? She gave a derisive snort.

                “You really think that’s all I am? Despite not knowing shit about me?”

                “Well, why else would you be doing it?”

                “Because it’s fun? Because I never asked to be a lady? Because I like jumping off buildings and running over the roof-tops and flinging myself off cliffs and drinking in dark bars where nobody knows who I am? Because being a Lady is so fucking boring and so fucking vapid and if I had to sit through one more bloody state banquet I was going to jump off this cliff? Is that OK by you?” She was shouting now, and for a brief moment, Gendry thought _she’s beautiful._ She was panting slightly too, her face pink with rage and her hands shaking a little.

                “Wait – running over rooftops? Were you by any chance doing that on the Street of Sisters earlier?” She was diverted by it, he saw her catch herself, catch her breath in her throat.

                “Yes.”

                “You jumped right over me,” he said, as he remembered seeing the girl falling through the air and landing with that joyful whoop. Gendry shoved his hands into his pockets, suddenly feeling rather stupid.

                “Don’t you ever wonder why I’m never photographed? I avoid it deliberately. When we turn sixteen, my father said we could all choose whatever we wanted to pursue as a career. My older brother is in the Navy, my cousin is in the Night’s Watch, my sister spent three years with the Septas at Baelor learning some shit about being a lady – and I went to Braavos. I’ve been over there three years now, doing mechanics, engineering and biology. I’ve got another two to go. As soon as I’m twenty-one, I’ll inherit the Gift.” Gendry knows of the Gift – a sparse, barren bit of land with a castle. “I’ll be a lady in my own right then, and I’ll have no choice but to go to all the banquets and the celebrations and the weddings and all the rest of that utter _crap_ so this is my last chance, my _only_ chance to be at least semi-anonymous. So I’m not _slumming it_ , thank you very much. I’m living my life before my life starts being lived for me.”

                “You could walk away, give it up,” Gendry pointed out, wondering why she doesn’t. It seems obvious to him, that if she doesn’t want it all, surely she can turn it all down and say she doesn’t want it. They’d probably be able to spare her enough cash to set herself up some other life in some other place. Braavos, maybe – he’d heard land was cheap over there. But she was shaking her head.

                “If a noble wants to give up their titles, lands and inheritances they need to have not only the King’s permission but their parents must consent too. Trust me, I thought about it. I even sounded out my father about it. Neither he nor my mother will consent to me giving up my titles and I can’t surrender the Gift without their consent.”

                “I didn’t realise.” She shrugged again.

                “Chains are chains, whatever they might be made of.”

                “Why’d you tell me all of this?” he asked. “It’s not like we’re friends.”

                “I don’t like people implying that I’m only in it for the thrills, for the rush of disobeying _Daddy,”_ she said, sneering. “If I wanted to do nothing but piss my father off, I’d just fuck the staff.” Gendry nearly choked at her frankness and that made her smirk. “Oh, am I making you uncomfortable?” she said, and he realised suddenly that she was teasing him. He pulled a face.

                “No.” He wonders if she is actually fucking the staff. She looked pretty cosy with that Pod guy. “Are you fucking the staff?” he asked, as blunt as she’d been. She smiled.

                “I might be. Would it bother you if I was?”

                “You’re nothing to do with me,” Gendry pointed out.

                “You’re right, I’m not. So, want to go back to that bar?”

                “Only if I can drive the bike,” he bargained, grinning. She laughed then, a proper laugh.

                “And if I say no?” she enquired. Gendry grinned at her, finding that he _liked_ this wild, funny, frustrated girl. She obviously found herself frustrated by life and the path that she’d been put on, and what she’d done so far was ballsy – from what she’d said or rather what she hadn’t said, he could read that neither of her parents had been exactly thrilled by her career choice. Breaking out might have been hard, but maybe it was the right thing to do. She’d suffocate at the Gift – or die of boredom.

                “Then I guess I’m hanging onto you again,” he answered her, and mischief lit her face.

                “Didn’t you enjoy it?” she teased, walking round him. God, she was tiny. She barely came up to his shoulders.

                “Made me feel like a damsel in distress,” he said and she hooted.

                “Then jump on,” she said, swinging her leg back over the bike. He wasn’t going to get to drive then. “I’ll be your knight in shining armour.”

                “Don’t you have helmets for this thing?” he asked, getting on anyway.

                “Don’t be such a baby, I won’t crash.”

 

She doesn’t, and it’s the closest thing to flying Gendry’s ever felt. Now she isn’t pissed off with him, she lets the bike out, and the roar of the wind and the buzz of the engine beneath him wakes something in him, something suspiciously like desire. When she parks back outside _The Staggered Pony_ , he climbs off with a stupid grin on his face. She’s smiling too, pink in her cheeks and a sparkle in her eye.

                “How much longer are you in town?” he asked, then immediately regretted it when her face fell.

                “Four days. I go back to Braavos on Wednesday.”

                “Why are you here?”

                “King’s birthday,” she says shortly. “My father’s the King’s oldest friend. Part of the deal I made my mother in exchange for five years in Braavos was that I would come home three times a year – her birthday, my father’s birthday and the King’s.”

                “Is four days enough time to trust me enough to drive the bike?” he asked, running his hand over the metalwork on hers. She raised her eyebrows at him

                “I thought you were a street-racer.”

                “Cars,” he explained. “And I don’t do that much now.” She nodded.

                “Got too dangerous?” she asked, grinning.

                “Got too arrest-y,” he answered and she hooted. He grinned, happy she’s laughing, even if it’s at him.

                “Are we going to that bar then?” she asked, setting off in the direction they started walking in the first time. “I’ve still got a couple of hours before I have to be back at the Keep.”

                “Sure. Hey, will your bodyguards get into trouble for leaving you behind?” he asked. She frowned in obvious confusion.

                “Bodyguards? Do you mean Sandor and Pod? They aren’t my bodyguards! Pod’s my father’s equerry and Sandor is his private secretary. I don’t have bodyguards!” She was definitely laughing at him now.

                “Oh. I thought that was something all royal people had.”

                “We’re not _royal_ , per se. Like we aren’t in line for the throne or anything,” she answered. “My parents have them, and my sister too, but Sansa only really has them because a couple of years ago some guy started stalking her.”

                “But they didn’t give them to you?”

                “I can take care of myself,” she answered, grinning.

 

And as she danced ahead to _The Blind Stag_ , Gendry could believe it.


	4. Arya II

Arya swept her eyes over the crowded interior of the new bar, and spotted Sandor, hulking head and shoulders above the crowd by the back wall. She caught Gendry’s hand in hers and started towing him through the crowd, muttering apologies when she bumped people. There was a lot of bumping, the place was heaving and she loved it. She loved the roughness, she loved the anonymity of the crowds. Here she was just a girl seeking a good time and nobody bowed or curtseyed or called her my lady and asked if she needed anything. Here she was just a girl, pulling a man through a crowded bar to find her friends.

 

Sandor had already brought her a drink, a spiced rum mixed with Coke, and Beric was clutching a beer for Gendry. They settled in, Gendry still beside her although she’d dropped his hand when they’d broken through the crowds. Despite how busy the bar was, there was a little circle of space around the group. Sandor was intimidating, standing six foot eight and burly with it. He’d been her father’s secretary longer than she could remember, and when she was a very little girl, he used to swing her up onto his shoulders, and she felt like a giant.

 

The band on stage was pretty good, despite the appalling acoustics of the place. People were dancing, jumping up and down and the whole crowd seemed like one big creature, as the lights flashed and pulsed and jumped. Arya drank and danced and leapt with them, Pod dancing with her occasionally, flashing that smile that meant _come to bed_. She probably would too, providing there wasn’t anyone around when they got back. Gendry did not dance, although she noticed him watching her. There was something dark in his eyes, like a wish or a want, especially when Pod danced with her. He probably thought nothing showed on his face, but she knew better. She’d seen enough men look at her like that to know. As a little bit of payback for the spoilt little rich girl comment – because that still rankled a bit – she stepped up her game with Pod. She stepped close to him, felt the play of the muscle when she wrapped an arm around his shoulders so she could lean her torso back while pressing forward with her hips. Pod complied at once, dropping his hands to put them on her hips, bringing her close. She stole a glance at Gendry, and was pleased to note he looked a mixture of irritated and amused. _Yeah,_ she thought, happily, shooting him a wink, _I’ll show you what fucking the staff looks like._

 

All too soon, it was half past eleven and Sandor was tapping her on the shoulder. They’d all had too much to drink to ride back to the Keep so it meant leaving now to walk it. She sighed and detached from Pod, turning to Beric. Shouting over the music, they said goodbyes and she found herself stumbling out of the bar, laughing as Pod put a possessive arm around her waist when a few smokers wolf-whistled her.

                “You two best be fucking off,” Sandor said. “I’ll make sure the bikes get back to the garage.” She walked along the streets with Pod, seeing the difference as they left Flea Bottom behind and came onto the fancier streets that wound round Aegon’s High Hill, closer to the Keep. Pod kept his arm around her waist, keeping her close and warm. He’d have to let go soon, but she didn’t want him to.

 

The streets here were already dark and silent, lights off and the people safe in bed. She glanced around, noticing their aloneness. There was a small park coming up, completely black at night, unlit and full of dark trees. She tugged his hand and led him down the track that led there, pulling him in.

                “Eager?” he said, laughing. The warmth of his breath on her neck made a shudder of pleasure down her spine. He was as keen as she was. They found the darkest part of the park, right in the centre. She pressed herself against him, kissing him desperately and he kissed back, his hands going to her waist under her jacket. He pressed her back into the tree, and she dragged him close, her hands unzipping his jacket to push his shirt up and scrape her nails over his belly, knowing it got him instantly hard. “How do you want it?” he panted, shoving a hand up her shirt and cupping a breast, toying with her.

                “Rough,” she panted, arching into his hand. She could feel his hardness, the raw evidence of his arousal, pressing into her belly. “But I want to do this first.”

 

She shoved them round, pressing him into the tree and dropping to her knees before him. He knotted a hand in her hair as her hands struggled impatiently with his belt buckle.

                “Gods, it’s hot when you’re on your knees for me,” he grunted, bucking involuntarily as she freed his cock. “Do you know how hard it is to concentrate when I see you in your father’s office? Remember when I bent you over his desk and fucked you so hard you had bruises on your hips for a week? Remember I had to shove my tie into your mouth to stop you screaming?” Arya moaned around his cock. If anyone else had spoken to her like this, she’d have punched them on the nose. But Pod was different, Pod had a _way_ of saying these things that made her wet in seconds. She used her free hand to wrestle open the buttons that fastened her trousers, so she could plunge her hand inside and touch herself as he kept talking. “Not as good as the time you were on your knees for me in the stables though,” Pod was saying, both his hands now holding her head as he fucked himself into her mouth. “And your sister came in, and I kept talking to her while you were on your knees with my cock in your throat and your fingers buried in your cunt as you fucked yourself. I loved how red you were when she left and I threw you down to fuck you.” Arya gasped at the memory, remembering how hard she’d come whilst he whispered in her ear that if she wasn’t quiet, Sansa might come back.

 

He pulled himself out of her mouth before she could get lost in the memories, pushing her shoulders down so she took her weight on arms and knees. Leaves crumpled in her hands as his hands pushed her shirt up under the jacket, pulled her bra cups down so roughly she heard thread ripping. The cool air hit her nipples and made her squirm, even as his hands went to her hips and pulled her trousers down. They were so tight they constricted her knees together. Two fingers plunged into her without a warning and she cried out, her head dropping with the pleasure as he pumped them into her rapidly. She could feel it building already as he crooked his fingers inside her and stroked that spot, the one that made her clench in pleasure around his fingers.

                “Gods, I love how wet you get,” Pod slurred a little behind her. “I wish I had time to bury my face between your legs and make you come before I fuck you.”

                “Later,” she said impatiently, pressing back as his fingers slid out. “Fuck me.”

                “Bossy,” he reproved, but she felt the pressure and then the burst as he slid inside her. She had to bite down on her arm to muffle the cry. With her legs kept together by the trousers around her knees, she felt a thousand times tighter than normal, the cock in her feeling _huge_. Judging by his curse, he felt the difference too. Something she loved about Pod was his stamina. He could fuck her so hard and fast for so long she sometimes felt like she would die from the sheer, dizzying pleasure. Knowing they had little time, knowing that was her reason for asking for it rough, he did it this time too. His hips snapped into her with appalling rapidity, his fingers curling tight into her hips as her arms shook. Eventually, they gave out completely and she slumped forward, her forehead touching the leaves beneath them, her cries now muffled by her forearm. It changed the angle, it changed the pace as Pod altered his stance to help and she _came_. She heard his cursing become constant, she heard his gasps and then felt his force as he drove into her as deep as he could and froze there, shaking behind her. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t speak, she couldn’t do anything but kneel there, slumped on the ground, panting like a wolf in heat.

 

He moved first, pulling out of her. She whimpered at the loss, at the sudden emptiness. There was a rustling behind her as he presumably dressed. He helped her to her feet then, pulled her knickers back up, pulled her trousers back up, pulled her bra over her breasts and her shirt down. She let him, docile as a lamb, head vague with post-orgasmic haze and bliss. Only that feeling of utter freedom when she jumped off things came close to this. He walked her home, let her go slow at first to get all the feeling back into her legs, but their detour and his consideration meant they had to run to the Hand’s Tower. Midnight chimed as she shut her door quietly behind her, having bidden Pod a very proper goodnight on the ground floor.

 

She nearly had heart failure when she turned to face her room itself. Her father was sitting on the bed. Oh dear God, what kind of a state was she in? Was there mud on her knees, her hands, her face? What did her hair look like? She couldn’t check, it would attract his eyes too. The room was mostly dark, only the bedside lamp on. Please God, let him overlook any signs.

                “Back on time, my little Cinderella,” he teased, and she relaxed. He wouldn’t be joking with her if he suspected.

                “Aren’t I always?” she shot back, hopping around as she removed her boots.

                “True. Did you have fun?”

                “Yes. Thank you,” she said, hoping he understood that she wasn’t just thanking him for the permission. She crossed the room and sat down at the dressing table, picking up her hairbrush.

                “It’s better than you sneaking out the window. At least this way I know where you are – within reason.”

                “I was just in Flea Bottom.” He raised his eyebrows and she pulled a face at him in the mirror. “Don’t, Dad,” she said, warningly. “Pod and Sandor were both there, I was perfectly safe. And anyway, the last published photograph of me was when I was _twelve._ ”

                “I know. But Flea Bottom is – rough.”

                “That’s why I like it.”

                “I know.” He came over to her then. His hand touched her rough black head and he smiled at her reflection. “I’m glad you had a good time, Arya. You can’t go disappearing tomorrow though.” She frowned but made no objection. It was all part of the deal. Her father allowed, even helped facilitate, her stolen hours of anonymous freedom, but he always demanded something in return. “We formally meet the King and Queen tomorrow. Your absence today was already noticed. You cannot duck out a second time. Then there’s the birthday banquet in the evening.” Arya nodded, however reluctantly. But she met her father’s gaze in the mirror.

                “Monday’s mine,” she said. “All day, not six hours of the afternoon and evening.” He nodded.

                “OK. Monday’s yours, _if_ you remain locatable and within the Red Keep all day tomorrow.”

                “Thank you,” she said again. He smiled and kissed her hair, before he left her room. She locked the door behind him, before she went to take a shower.

 

Before she slept though, she had come up with a plan for Monday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Should have said at the end of the first chapters... Updates are every two days.
> 
> If this isn't possible for any reason, I will let you all know ahead of time :)


	5. Gendry III

Gendry found himself thinking about her, much to his annoyance. He thought about her as he watched the band play through their set, as he walked home, as he drunkenly staggered around his flat getting undressed. He thought about her as he was lying in bed.

 

He remembered that wink she’d shot him, even as she basically dry-humped that page boy or squire or whatever the hell she’d said he was. He looked bloody familiar with her anyway, whoever he was. He knew what it meant too, that she was getting her own back for him calling her a spoilt brat. She knew he was attracted to her – of course she did, girls that rich and that powerful always assumed people were attracted to them. A little voice in his head told him that that wasn’t fair to lump Arya in like that. She wasn’t. She wasn’t doing anything for the cheap thrill. She was doing to be free.

 

And she was haunting him, after two meetings and an argument. Despite himself, he remembered the casual way she’d taken his hand to tow him through the crowd at the gig, the way her hand had felt so small and so strong in his. He turned his pillow over to get the cool side, punching it to try and fluff it up a bit, turning over with a huff of frustration. What the hell was wrong with him?

 

He woke up on Sunday to a persistant banging. It took him a minute to realise it wasn’t just his head. He rolled out of a bed with a groan. Whoever it was wasn’t bloody going away. His alarm clock glowed mockingly in the light. Half past twelve. He made it down the stairs without stumbling, and fumbled with the chain and deadbolt. When he finally got the thing open, he was greeted by Pod. He was in a suit, quite obviously tailor-made, with an unassuming trench coat open over it. He was smiling and looked infuriatingly un-hungover.

                “May I come in?” Pod asked.

                “You may as well,” Gendry grumbled. “After you’ve probably disturbed half the street. Coffee?”

                “Oh no, I won’t come up,” Pod said, smiling. “You look rough.”

                “Thanks,” Gendry growled.

                “I’ve been sent here,” Pod continued, happily impervious to Gendry’s mood. “By the Lady Stark.”

                “Oh, now she’s _Lady_ Stark?”

                “She requested I give you this,” Pod continued, ignoring the jibe. He pulled a package out of the inside pocket of his coat.

                “What is it?”

                “I’m sure that will become clear after you open it.”

                “She didn’t tell you?”

                “Certainly not, and I didn’t ask. Drink some water, Gendry, you look truly atrocious.” Pod let himself out before Gendry could fully weigh up all the pros and cons oftaking a swipe at him. A car started outside somewhere, and Gendry turned to stamp back upstairs. He threw the envelope on the kitchen table, unable to deal with whatever the hell Lady Arya bloody Stark felt the need to send him, by personal carrier, without a coffee and some painkillers.

 

It was nearly three before he felt well enough to open it. He tipped the contents onto his coffee table and raised an eyebrow. It was a phone, not flashy or expensive or top of the range, just an old-model Samsung. It looked new though, and there was a note. He unfolded it.

 

_Gendry – this phone is encrypted. It’s got a direct number for me inside it. It’s set up ready to go. I’m caged for the day, but have a pass on tomorrow for good behaviour. Call me; we’ll take the bike out._

_Yours, the spoilt rich girl._

He stared at the few lines, his brain still muzzy from the booze. She was insane; there were no two ways about it. She’d sent him a phone, just so they could talk. She was assuming a hell of a lot. Irritated and still too hungover for games, Gendry switched the thing on. She was the only one in the contacts list, but when he clicked on it, it didn’t show a number. It was just her name. Nice to know she trusted him. He typed out a text message.

 

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: You’re assuming an awful lot, my Lady. Who says I’m interested?_

He didn’t expect a reply right away, so he threw the phone onto the table and turned on the TV. He called out for Dornish for dinner, unable to motivate himself to cook anything. It was nearly five before it buzzed. He debated about just ignoring it, letting her hang, but his curiosity got the better of him.

 

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: The hard-on you have for my bike. And don’t call me my Lady._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: Or what, my Lady? You’ll get some goons on me? Bring it – I’ve been the bare-knuckle champ for two years in this city._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Don’t tempt me, Bull. If you come, I’ll let you drive it... and I know you’ll love what I have in mind._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: I’m busy tomorrow. Some of us have to work for our living, those of us without a trust fund anyway._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: You aren’t working tomorrow._

Gendry frowned down at his phone. How did she know that? Before he could send a text back, it buzzed again.

 

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Come. I swear you’ll enjoy it. Pick you up at ten?_

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: How do you know I’m not working? Ten is a ridiculous hour._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: A gentleman doesn’t ask and a lady doesn’t tell. Eleven then. Wear something tight._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: Excuse me?!_

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: You read it right. Eleven. I’ll pick you up from your home._

He stared at the phone, utterly speechless. She was bloody presumptuous. But even only to himself, Gendry couldn’t lie – he wanted a go at driving that bike badly. He wanted to rev the engine, feel the vibration of the power under his thighs and arse as he flew. He wanted it badly. Badly enough to swallow his pride and go wherever she wanted? Probably. And, irritatingly, she knew it. She’d dangled the bike in front of him like bait in front of a fish. And he’d swallowed the lot – hook, line and sinker. Gods, that was infuriating. And it was keeping her on his mind too. He finished his takeaway, sulking slightly about the anticipation he was feeling. What the hell was she planning? Knowing her reputation, something dangerous.

 

Faceless, they called her, because of a tattoo. She’d referenced it herself. She BASE jumped. Quite a stir had been created last year, when, right before she disappeared, she’d jumped off the Dragon Pit in a wingsuit. She’d screamed the whole way, opening impossibly low, swooping over the hills like a bird. He’d heard the stories from those lucky enough to witness it. He had to hope she didn’t plan to take him on that sort of outing. He didn’t have too much of a head for heights. If she tried to get him to leap off the Sept, he’d probably piss himself.

 

He debated for a while about telling her that, before he decided no, he didn’t want her to have a weakness to exploit. A girl who apparently knew his schedule and his address – and wasn’t that a good point, how did she know that? – probably wouldn’t need twelve hours to change plans. How long had it taken her to get hold of an encrypted phone and get it sent to him? Hours? He had to wonder what it must be like having that much power.

 

He spent the rest of the day vegetating in front of the TV. The Dornish food had been good, spicy and warming as it helped dispel the lingering hangover. A phone buzzed. He reached into his pocket, frowning when there was no notification waiting for him. Then he remembered, he had two phones now. The phone Arya had sent was sitting innocently on his coffee table. He snatched it up.

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: The Crown Prince just threw up in a plant pot. I have had to excuse myself from the table to laugh. I’m locked in the toilet. Say something to sober me up._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: I am not your performing monkey, Stark._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: No, that just made me laugh more. You’re bad at this. Very bad. Seriously, my getting out tomorrow depends on me being a good little girl and playing the game. Help me._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: And why would I care?_

_TO: GENDRY:_

_FROM: ARYA: Because tomorrow will be fun with a capital FUN. Do you want a hint?_

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: No._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: Think about the parents fucking._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: You are disgusting._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Thanks._

He threw the phone away from him, onto the table. He was irritated by how easy it was to speak to her, to get a banter going. Everything she did irritated him, he realised, but it was always tempered by the amusement he felt.

 

He went to bed feeling distinctly huffy. He was going to have to have a word about the assumptions.

 


	6. Arya III

Arya was bored senseless within five minutes of sitting down at the banquet. When she was younger, she probably would have made it an hour before flinging a roll at her sister, just so she could be sent to bed and not have to sit there anymore. If she was honest, it was tempting now, and the only thing stopping her was the promise of tomorrow. Her mother had forced her into a dress, ridiculous shoes she could barely walk in and a hairstyle she hated.

 

Jon wasn’t even here, unable to get leave for the weekend, so there was nobody for her to even pull faces at to relieve some of the feeling. The dress was uncomfortable, some hideous strapless number that she was terrified of falling out of. The one and only bright spot was how Pod had stared when he’d come to tell her it was time to go down for dinner. She’d invited him in while she fixed her jewellery, and he’d got in a grope while he helped her with her necklace. In hindsight, that had only made it all worse, given that now she was imagining getting him into her bed.

 

She smirked when she remembered the report he’d given her on Gendry’s dishevelled appearance and general air of moodiness when he’d obliged her by taking the package to him. He’d not been a happy bunny, and that was evidenced by the way he’d kept her waiting until three before he’d sent a message. And then it had been a sarcastic crack that had made her equal parts amused and annoyed. She’d deliberately left him hanging in return, hoping to get to him. The banter had started quickly then though, him replying at once, more sarcasm. She’d been amused by the attempt to get out of the plans, claiming work. Did he really think she’d go to all the trouble of getting him a phone, having it encrypted, only to be foiled by such a weak excuse? She’d checked on that before she’d done anything else. He’d agreed to come at least.

 

The Crown Prince was quite obviously drunk. Everyone was being terribly diplomatic and ignoring the transgression, but Arya could barely contain herself. Only the promise of tomorrow was stopping her from open contempt. His voice was so loud and so obnoxious. He was droning on and on about a hunt he’d been on the day before, boasting about his kill. Quite unwittingly, Arya caught her sister’s eye, and both of them had to bury their faces into their napkins so as not to burst out laughing. Sansa, once, had had the biggest, most embarrassing fancy for the Crown Prince, and since she’d got over it, they could barely talk about him without shrieking with laughter. The Lady Catelyn was looking as neutral as ever as she engaged the Queen in conversation, but Arya could see the gleam in her own eye whenever she looked to her children. Her father was ignoring the whole scenario. She wished she had that kind of self-control. The fish course arrived then, and Arya was pleased to note that someone, eventually, had realised that she absolutely despised fish. She still had some, but it was a small enough portion that she could force it down and disguise it with the salad to some extent. Joffrey wasn’t happy either, she noticed. He was looking a bit green, actually.

 

Oh Gods, she would not be able to control herself if he vomited. She was already on the absolute brink of laughter. She could excuse herself though, if she had to. All she would have to do was catch her father’s eye, receive his nod, get up, ask the King to excuse her, curtsey and run. Could she do all that, without laughing? Perhaps she should do it now. But then, of course, she might miss it. No, she would have to stay. It would be a good lesson in self-control. Tomorrow was a very juicy carrot too, to tempt her to keep acting, to keep the mask in place, to keep the face of Lady Arya Stark in place. Sansa was obviously struggling too. Arya could tell by the way she sipped her wine more often than she would otherwise, and how she used the fine sweep of her hair to hide her face from the King. She was sat beside her private secretary, that Baelish fellow who Arya never quite liked. He made her skin prickle, but Sansa seemed to like him. She was certainly sitting quite close. Baelish looked as amused as the Stark girls felt, and he certainly wasn’t trying to hide it.

 

Suddenly, as the fish course was being cleared away, there was a disturbance. Joffrey shoved his chair back, staggered to the side of the room – and vomited spectacularly into a plant pot. Sansa gasped audibly, before she pressed her napkin to her face and disguised it as a cough. The Queen’s face went dark with anger, and Arya shot to her feet. There was no time for meeting her father’s eye. She walked sedately around the table, and swept the King a deep curtsey.

                “Your Majesty, may I be excused?” she said, her voice impressively level. The King waved his hand.

                “Of course,” he shouted. He was quite drunk too, it had to be admitted, but he was better at holding it in than his son. “There will be a pause no doubt.” Arya curtseyed again and left the room, finding the bathroom in time to laugh her head off in private. She pulled out her phone from the hidden pocket of the dress, and texted Gendry at once. His reply was rapid, thank the Gods, although his thinly veiled indignation only amuses her more.

 

She nearly vomited herself when he gave her his version of sobering up. Still, it did the trick, and she was able to flush the toilet and go back out. She bumped straight into her father. He looked amused too, so at least she knew she wasn’t in trouble.

                “You did well leaving,” he said, smiling at her.

                “Thank you, I thought so,” she said, complacently. “Is the Crown Prince quite well now?”

                “The Queen has dealt with the situation,” he said. “I thought now the drama was over I would come to find you.”

                “I’m recovered,” she said, smiling.

                “Then, Lady Stark, may I escort you?” he said, offering her his arm. She accepted and he walked her back to the dining hall, when she curtseyed again to the King and re-took her place at the table. The main course was a roasted chicken, served with vegetables and roasted potatoes. This was proper food at least, and she dug in enthusiastically. Sansa pulled a face at her when she’d got back, but it wasn’t until after dinner that she got the explanation. They had been excused from the dancing at eleven, and they left the Hall together, linking arms.

 

Not so long ago, they’d been at each other’s throats at all hours of the day. They had had nothing at all in common, mutual misunderstanding making the rift worse. In a way, though, that stalker who’d started targeting Sansa was a blessing in disguise. Arya had been halfway through her first year in Braavos, and Bran had let the secret slip during a Skype call. She’d been on the next flight home and had popped up with a fury the likes of which even she hadn't known she was capable of feeling. She’d called in a few favours a few people in the city owed her, and the stalker had been caught in days. Her father had been quite impressed by her actions, even though he had been obliged to tell her off a little bit for the unorthodox way she’d gone about it. Sansa had been nothing been grateful and before Arya had to return to Braavos, things had started to heal. Now, although they still baffled each other, they were closer than ever.

                “I can’t believe you managed to run out,” Sansa grumbled now. “I was so close to laughter. Oh, you should have seen it – Joffrey tried to come back to the table and tripped over the rug. The Queen was so angry! She told the servants to take him to bed, and to carry the plant outside.” Arya snorted.

                “I wouldn’t have been able to sit through that,” she said.

                “I barely could. Thank the Gods for Petyr,” she said. “He started listing every King of Westeros since time immemorial, under his breath obviously, and then started purposely making mistakes. I had to listen to hear him properly and then of course, just had to correct him when he claimed that Aegon the Mad came before Aegon the Conquerer.”

                “Wish someone could have sobered me down that quickly,” Arya grumbled. “I had to think about Mother and Father doing the nasty.” Sansa made a disgusted sound. “I know, I know, but it was the only chance I had of being able to return to the table.”

                “Are you still going out tomorrow?” Sansa asked, as they reached her rooms. Arya nodded.

                “Yes.”

                “Jumping or running?” Arya grinned.

                “Neither. I’m taking someone somewhere.”

                “Well, that sounds cryptic.”

                “Indeed,” Arya said, smirking. “What are you doing tomorrow?”

                “Petyr and I are going to the Sept of Baelor in the morning,” her sister said. “Then we’re discussing the plans for my twenty-first birthday.” She looked at her sister then. “I know you don’t normally come home for my birthday,” she began, hesitantly. “And I know it’s in the middle of your exams and everything. But – my twenty-first is a big birthday.” Arya knew that. When Sansa turned twenty-one, she would be eligible to marry if she chose, and she would formally inherit Riverun, the Tully property that came down through their mother. And the birthday was big, the last chance her sister would have at freedom.

                “I’ll try and be here,” Arya promised. “As soon as I get my exam timetable I’ll let you know. Even if I have to fly here and back in a day, I’ll come if I can.” Sansa beamed.

                “Thank you,” she said, squeezing her sister’s arm. Sansa slipped into her own rooms and Arya turned to climb the stairs to her own. She pulled the phone out of her pocket on the way, and was amused to notice the message notification.

 

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: I hope jeans and a t-shirt are tight enough for your purposes. Where are you taking me, anyway, some kind of high-class whore house?_

She smirked to herself as she closed the door, and typed out a response.

 

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Wouldn’t you like to know. Jeans and a t-shirt should be fine. Nothing flapping about._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: Well that’s fine – my things don’t flap. The advantage of not being microscopically small is that I can wear normal clothes._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: The Gods grow things only until they’re perfect. I just got there much, much sooner than some._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: You keep telling yourself that, doll._

Despite herself, she smiled at the ‘doll’ comment. That sounded uncommonly like a pet name – and felt like a victory. Like she’d got to him. Like she was under his skin. She decided not to reply. It would keep the anticipation sweet.

 

 


	7. Gendry IV

Gendry woke the next morning in a mood. She hadn’t text him back the night before, after he’d made that crack about her being a doll. She’d left him to stew, he was almost certain. He wanted her to text him back, he realised, wanting to continue their banter. He imagined her after the dinner or banquet or whatever the hell it was. Had they put her in a dress, heels, jewellery? He wondered what that would be like, what dress they would be able to find that would cover up the tattoos. The wolf head on her chest would be a challenge in of itself. How many others did she have, he wondered? She’d told Beric she had two new ones, then teased him by hinting that they were somewhere intimate – or at least somewhere that wouldn’t be easy to expose in a bar. Or did they maybe just let her get the tattoos out?

 

He’d been irritated that he’d text her last night too, after the banter was over. Why had he done that? Up until then, she had initiated most of the conversation. And texting her at night was somehow oddly intimate. He pictured her lying in a huge bed, in a ridiculously sumptuous room. He wondered what the Keep looked like inside.

 

At eleven, he was dressed and mostly ready, just needing to brush his teeth, pick out shoes and a jacket. The roar of the bike outside attracted his attention, and he glanced out of the window. There it was, that beautiful bike. She wasn’t on it either, but that was explained when a jaunty knock sounded at his door. He went down, stomping a little. She was there, grinning at him, her hair scraped back into a low tail. She was wearing those leather trousers again, a black leather jacket over it, thrown open to show a very tight green t-shirt. It looked like she’d been painted into them.

                “Ready?” she demanded, bouncing excitedly on the balls of her feet. He sighed.

                “Nearly.” Against his better judgement, he pushed the door open wider. “You want to come up?” She nodded, and he gestured that she could go ahead of him. She surprised him by shaking her head.

                “Oh no. No precedence today. It’s your flat. You show it to me.” He shrugged, and went up the stairs. He was very conscious suddenly that his jeans were tight, and her eyes would be basically arse-level. He knew that if he’d been following her, their positions reversed, his eyes would have been glued to hers. They came out into the hallway and he gestured.

                “Bathroom’s there. Then my bedroom at the end, and this is the kitchen and living room,” he said, walking through the door. She followed him, and in the quiet of the flat, he could hear the creak of high-quality leather as she moved. She skirted round him and looked round appreciatively.

                “It’s nice!” she exclaimed. “Did you do the decorating, or was it like this when you moved in?”

                “It’s a rent,” he explained. “I can’t make any major changes.” She nodded her understanding.

                “Unless you want them to keep all the deposit, right?” she said. When he raised his eyebrows, she smiled. “I rent a place in Braavos. Same deal. The fight I had to find somewhere that wasn’t flat magnolia all over the place.” He hadn’t thought that she’d rent. He would have assumed her family had a place out there, somewhere she could stay surrounded by luxury. He found he was smiling to think of her, in her leather and wealth, sitting on a shitty sofa in a cramped flat in Braavos. She was wandering into his kitchen, opening his fridge.

                “Looking for something?” he queried, as he sat down on the sofa to put his boots on. He paused before he did so, holding one up. “Will these shoes be OK, by the way?” She glanced up.

                “Perfect. I always like looking in the fridge,” she explained, closing it. “You can tell a lot about a person by their fridge – is the milk fresh, expired? Have they got vegetables or beer in the crisper drawer? Have they got some potatoes at the back growing tentacles?” He chuckled.

                “Look at this place,” he said, grinning. He stood up when he finished lacing the boots and pulled his jeans down over them, gesturing round the room. “It’s tidy. Do I look like a man to keep tentacle-ridden potatoes?”

                “No,” she conceded. “But if you’d just tidied in anticipation, the fridge would betray you. You do keep beer in the vegetable crisper though.” He shrugged.

                “Keeps the shelves clear. I’m going to brush my teeth. Feel free to keep poking about.”

 

She was on the sofa when he came back in, pulling on his jacket.

                “Well, I’m ready,” he announced, and she hopped up, grinning. She bounced down the stairs, letting herself out. She crossed back over to the bike and jigged around impatiently as he locked up and sauntered over. She was holding a helmet.

                “You need to wear this,” she instructed. “Not least because I’m known in the parts of the city we’re riding through.” He pulled it on, and struggled with the strap. She laughed, and knocked his hands away. Her fingers brushed at his throat as she fastened it. He saw her grin as she reached up and clicked his visor into place.

 

He held her waist tight as she drove them through the city and out through the Mud Gate. When they left the walls of the city behind them, well onto the Kingsroad, she let the bike out. Gendry let out a noise he hoped to the Gods she didn’t hear, and tightened his hold on her waist. The bike roared and leapt, snarling like a beast as she pushed it to its limits. She was laughing, he realised, and knew she must have heard the noise and felt his hold tighten on her. She leant forward, and pushed further.

 

It was flying, there was no other word for it. He was actually flying, as the fields and river and sheep whipped past, reduced to nothing but blurs by Arya’s speed. He wanted to close his eyes, he wanted to never close them again, he wanted to whoop aloud. He was starting to save tomorrow for a bike of his own. He needed to feel this again and again, to feel this utter freedom.

 

It must have been an hour before she stopped, somewhere near Riverrun. She swung them into a tiny, deserted clearing in some trees, stopping the bike. Gendry didn’t move. He kept his arms around her waist, holding her back against him, eyes wide as they stared at the place around him. Was she going to ritually sacrifice him? She hadn’t moved either, he noticed, not to move away from him at least. She was taking her helmet off, hanging it off the bike handles. She turned slightly in his arms, smiling at him. Her fingers scrabbled under his chin, unfastening his helmet, before she pulled it off his head. His hair was probably absolutely everywhere, and all he could do was look down at her as she grinned up at him. He couldn’t speak. She smelt like leather and the sharp scent of oranges was clinging to her hair. Under it, he felt like he could smell motor oil.

                “Did you like it?” she asked him, her smile brighter than the sun.

                “I need a motorbike,” he answered, and she laughed. She jabbed an elbow into his belly.

                “Come on, off you get,” she directed. He obeyed her, swinging his leg off the back of the bike and standing up on slightly shaky legs. He had to hope she didn’t notice. She vaulted off lightly, and put the kick stand down, hanging his helmet beside hers on the handlebars. “Can you walk?” she queried.

                “Of course,” he said. “You aren’t that good, Stark.” She laughed at him.

                “I’m astonishingly good,” she answered, winking. “You just don’t know it yet. Come on.”

 

She led him through the trees, and they came out at the top of a waterfall. She was taking off her jacket, he noticed, and for a horrible moment he thought she planned to jump. But when she leant over the falls and waved it, he nearly had heart failure.

                “What are you doing?” he shouted, lunging forward. He seized her by the waist, yanking her backwards, slamming her body into his and wrapping her in his arms. She gave a surprised shriek, stumbling as he yanked, more falling into him than stepping into him. His heart was slamming in his chest, her head was basically level with it – could she feel it? He was panting, the adrenaline from the bike ride and the moment of fear as he thought she’d fall thrumming through his veins. The wind caught her hair, stirring the tail. A bird screamed somewhere.

                “What the hell?” she gasped, still in his arms. Suddenly he felt foolish, like he’d been doing something stupid.

                “I thought you were going to fall,” he said, still holding her.

                “I was safe,” she said, freeing herself gently. “But thanks. For saving me.” He shoved his hands into his pockets, feeling like a child. The silence between them stretched, and she pulled her jacket back on. “Come on,” she said at last, turning away. “Follow me.”

 

She led him down a little path that he’d never seen, a rough, narrow thing. At the bottom of the waterfall, a man was waiting. Arya thanked him, money changed hands, and she gave him instructions in a low voice. He nodded and turned away, heading up the path she had just led him down. Arya turned to a duffel bag he’d left.

                “What the hell are we doing?” he demanded.

                “Ever been caving?” she asked, smiling at him. She unzipped the bag and revealed ropes, torches, flares and an empty rucksack. She handed him a helmet and head torch, directing him put them on. He did so, a quiver of excitement taking him. Beric always used to try and get him to go caving, and he’d always had to say no for one reason or another. She was buckling a belt of karabiners around her hips and sliding a pickaxe through it.

                “I assume you’ve filed a flight plan,” he said, drily. “I’m way too tired for this to turn into a _The Descent_ style situation.” She hooted.

                “Gods that film was creepy,” she answered. “The sequel was a pile of shit though, wasn’t it?”

                “Awful,” he agreed, taking the belt she handed him. He had coils of ropes and some weird things that looked almost like an eyelash curler. “What is this?” he asked, holding one up.

                “If you need to bridge a gap or anything, those attach to cracks in the ceiling or the wall. You can hook the karabiners through them and then attach the ropes. They’ve got a name, but I’m beggared if I can remember it,” she continued, and Gendry snorted.

                “As long as you can remember how to use it.”

                “Of course. Right, come here.” He went over obligingly, and she reached up, switching on his headlamp. “I’ve got spare batteries and spare lights in the bag, but we shouldn’t be in there long. It’s not a big cave. Are you claustrophobic?”

                “No. Have you brought food?” he enquired. Her eyes sparkled.

                “It’s in the bag. Don’t worry, I took care of everything.”

                “I assumed that guy had taken care of it?”

                “Oh, that was Jory,” she said. “I just had him meet us here with the gear, so we could bring the bike. He’ll go back to where I parked and make sure nobody nicks it.”

                “You’re going to make him stand there? All day?”

                “No, don’t be silly. But I couldn’t fit both helmets and the bike locks in the box, so he agreed that after he met us, he’d go back to the bike and lock it up for me. You didn’t seriously think I’d make him stand there all day, did you?” she asked, amusement in her eyes. He shrugged and she smirked. “Fair enough. Ready?”

                “Ready,” he confirmed. She grinned, and turned towards the waterfall.

 

 


	8. Arya IV

She could still remember how his arms had felt when he’d pulled her back from the edge of the waterfall, how solid his body had felt against hers. How loud his heartbeat had been against her ear. He’d looked so sheepish, so irritated, when she’d said she’d been in no danger, but she’d found his gesture endearing. It was nice that he cared. His face had lit up like a Christmas tree when she’d told him they were going caving together. He’d looked so happy, so cheerful about it, and the last vestiges of his embarrassment over the incident at the top of the falls had obviously eased off.

She had to admit she liked him. He was good-looking with that dark hair and those devastating blue eyes, the stubble on his jawline and the heavy eyebrows. He was ripped from the bare-knuckle fights. The cut lip she’d noticed the first night she’d seen him was less bruised now, but still sore-looking. More than the looks though, he took no shit – from her, or anyone else. The way he’d glowered when she implied Jory would be standing watch on the bike while they caved had been sweet. He obviously couldn’t care less about who she was, until and unless she sought to use it to make other people’s lives harder. She knew the phone had been a sore spot for him, but she hadn’t been able to think of another way to contact him. She could, of course, have had Pod get his number for her. But that would have left him with hers, and as much as she did like all she’d seen of Gendry, she couldn’t risk someone who was essentially a total stranger having her phone number. It wasn’t worth the risk. 

His steps sounded behind her as she skirted the waterfall, and led him behind it. The cave opening was small enough for her to walk along standing straight, but the impatient sigh she heard behind her told her that he had had to bend.   
“Told you,” she called over her shoulder. “Small is good.”  
“Get to fuck,” he answered, and she laughed. It echoed round them.  
“Don’t worry, it’s not much further.” 

They walked for about five minutes, then she stopped him. She could feel his breath on her neck. She felt at her belt for one of the flares.   
“Stand back,” she instructed. She felt rather than heard him move back. She lit it up and threw it. It lit the cave in a red glow, and she heard his gasp.   
“What the hell?”   
“Riverrun was built over old copper mines,” she explained. “When they stopped pulling it out the ground, they just closed the mines off.” The flare was sparkling off the veins of copper, off the wetness of the rock. The pool in the centre of the cave was sending off tendrils of steam. From far above them, daylight found its way in through the waterfall, above the rock wall.  
“Is it warm here?” he asked, stepping forward. She let him go ahead of her, knowing there was no way for him to hurt himself, no tunnels or holes in the rock floor.  
“Natural spring,” she explained. “Winterfell has them too, lots of them. No matter how cold the winter gets up there, or how much it snows, they rarely freeze over.”  
“That’s your home, isn’t it?”  
“Yes. My father is the Lord of Winterfell,” she explained to him. “I grew up there.”  
“Must have been a shock,” he said, smiling at her. Something turned in her belly at the sight of that smile, and she realised it was lust. “Going from Winterfell to Braavos,” he elaborated, and she managed to laugh.  
“Yes, it was a bit,” she said, walking down to join him. “So, do you like it?”   
“It’s amazing. Is there more to it?”  
“Of course,” she said, mildly indignant. “Do you really think I’d drive all this way just for this?” She lead him down a passage in the opposite end of the hall-like space, not waiting to see if he’d follow. She knew he would. 

She had to hope he appreciated her arse in the same way she’d admired his when she’d followed him up the stairs at his flat. She knew already that she wanted him, and she had to hope he wanted her. She could think of a thousand fun things to do with him – either in the cave or otherwise. Maybe on that battered old sofa of his. She’d sat on it to test it, and while it had certainly seen better days, she thought it would probably stand it if he let her climb on his dick and ride him until they were both helpless wrecks. That idea certainly had merit. It might be a bit too damp in the cave itself for an encounter anyway. Or a complete encounter anyway. Her leathers were waterproof at least so she could kneel if the occasion called for it. He could take a knee on his jacket; she could swing a leg over those broad shoulders –  
“Are you even listening to me?” his voice demanded. She started, and thanked the Gods she had her back to him so he wouldn’t see the colour start in her cheeks.  
“Sorry, Gendry, I was concentrating on the floor. What did you say?”  
“I asked how much further we had to go. And if you were planning on hiking us straight through the mountain.”  
“It isn’t much further,” she answered, thanking the Gods that the passage had only to be followed straight on, and not turned off. “In fact, we should see the cavern any time now.” 

She was right too. Suddenly, the darkness ahead of them opened up, a yawning black cavern. She threw out an arm and stopped Gendry, whirling round to him.   
“Do you trust me?” she asked him. He looked down at her.   
“Should I?”   
“Well, probably not to be perfectly honest,” she said, and was rewarded by him cracking a smile at her. “But just for now, do you trust me?” There was a silence, a long one, while he stared down at her and smiled, a certain playfulness in it.   
“I trust you,” he said and she gave him a smile of her own. She reached out, and took both of his hands in hers.   
“Close your eyes,” she whispered. He did so, and she smiled again, although he wouldn’t see this one. She led him into the cavern, her headlamp picking out the way. She pulled him in a little way and then stopped.  
“Can I –“  
“Don’t you dare,” she answered. “Not until I say. I’m going to let go of your hands, and light a flare. Then I’m going to come back to you and turn your headlamp off. Then you can open your eyes.”  
“Can’t I even peek?” he asked.  
“Not so much as a peep,” she said. “Can I trust you, Gendry? Or do I need to blindfold you?” He smirked at that.  
“I prefer to be brought a beer before a woman blindfolds me. You can trust me.”

She stepped away, lit the flare – lit two, for good measure, throwing one to the left, one to the right. She reached up, switched out her own lamp, then turned back to him. His eyes were still closed tight. She walked back, brushing close to him, felt him inhale as she reached up for his lamp, switching it off. She waited in silence for a moment, using the seconds to examine his face. He was handsome; there were no two ways about it. She wanted him; there were no two ways about that either. She sighed, quiet and gentle, and then spoke to him.  
“Open your eyes, Gendry,” she said, and her voice was low. He did, and she watched his face as he looked around.   
“Oh my Gods,” he whispered. She grinned, loving the awe in his face. 

The cavern was impressive, she had to admit it. When Sandor had taken her and Sansa down here years ago, she’d been rendered silent by it. The roof of it was out of sight, and she knew that she could have lit up twenty flares and it still would have been lost to darkness. Stalactites hung down from this blackness, joining stalagmites to form a hundred columns of glittering quartz-riven rock. From far below their feet, somewhere came the muffled roar of an underground river. Around the walls were cave paintings too, lit up by the flares. He walked around her, rotating on the spot as he stared around at the scene before him.  
“They think this cavern is thousands of years old,” Arya said, smiling at his awe. “They think it was somewhere the Children of the Forest and the First Men lived. The original entrance is lost, but when they mined here, they opened up the passageway we came down, and when they dug through the wall, they found this. The river you can hear flows into the Trident eventually.”   
“This is – this is fucking amazing.”  
“I told you that this would be fun,” she said, grinning at him as he turned back to her. “And you didn’t believe me.” He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender, his eyes still slightly dazed.  
“And I was wrong.”  
“Yes you were,” she agreed. “Sandor brought me and Sansa here years ago. I was only ten. I stood right here, like you are, and I stared around me and I realised I didn’t know anything about the country I lived in. I only saw the streets. This cave made me realise that there was so much more to the world than I’d ever seen. Look up. What do you see?”   
“Nothing,” he said, gazing up into the blackness above them.  
“Nobody knows how high this is, how far up it goes. We’re under the mountain. It could go on forever – or so it seems. And I wanted to know what it would be like to stand on top of the world and look down.” He looked at her then.   
“Why did you bring me here?” he asked, abruptly. “When it means so much to you, why bring me, basically a total stranger?” She stared at him.  
“Remember Harranhal? When we had a sword-fight with sticks?”  
“I didn’t know who you were then,” he said.  
“And if you had, you would never have engaged with me. And even when you found out, and when we met again on Saturday night, you didn’t really care who I was. You’re the only person, the only person I have ever met, who has realised who and what I am and not given a shit. You know how many people have ever spoken to me like you did on Saturday?”  
“Three or four?” he guessed, frowning.  
“None,” she answered, stepping towards him. He was so much taller she couldn’t get too close if she wanted to still be able to watch his face. “None. As soon as people figure it out, as soon as the title and the inheritance and the wealth is out in the open, people go all funny. They start bowing and calling me my Lady, and no matter how much of an arsehole I am, they just keep smiling because they daren’t call Lady Stark out on anything. All my life, since I was ten years old and standing in this cave, all I wanted was the freedom it represented. And you spoke to me like you thought I was shit on your shoe and I loved it. That’s why I brought you here.” She fell silent, afraid she’d said too much, afraid she’d sound stupid and pretentious. He said nothing, and she couldn’t bear it, she had to look away. “Sorry. That sounded stupid. Ignore it, forget it, it means nothing.” She made to walk around him, to go and look at the paintings.

His hand came out, grabbed her, making her lose her footing for the second time, once more bumping into his body.   
“It’s not stupid,” he said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all, I am sorry to do this, but I need a few days - I am on my holidays! And I don't have the time to dedicate to how much writing this story takes.
> 
> However, do not fear! I shall return on Sunday 10th, so just a week away!
> 
> I will also reply to all of your lovely comments as soon as I can!


	9. Gendry V

                “Sorry. That sounded stupid. Ignore it, forget it, it means nothing.” She looked embarrassed and he couldn’t bear it. She looked distressed, and that was worse. She moved again, but not towards him this time – she was making to go around him.

 

His hand came out, grabbed her, making her lose her footing for the second time, once more bumping into his body.

                “It’s not stupid,” he said. “Don’t say that, don’t look like that. I get it – although I honestly didn’t mean to speak to you like you were shit on my shoe.” She snorted then, an amused little laugh that made his belly jolt in a weird way. “I guess I get it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, from my point of view you’re lucky. You’ll never sweat over your bank account, worrying about the rent and the gas bill, you’ll never worry about needing to find the money right before payday to buy groceries – but I get it. I get what it’s like not to be able to live the life you want.” She nodded.

                “I’m grateful,” she said, and he heard her voice soften. “I am, don’t get me wrong. I _know_ how lucky I am. But I would give up all of it, all the money and the titles and the properties, if it meant I could spend the rest of my life having people yell at me when I deserve it.”

                “Keep my number,” he joked. “I’ll happily yell at you. As it happens, I already have a couple of bones to pick.” She laughed then, a real laugh, and he grinned down at her, putting her gently away from him.

                “Is it for using my power for evil, and finding out your address, work schedule and making many assumptions about your availability to come into dark caves with me?”

                “As it happens, yes,” he said, trying to glare at her. When she only smiled, he knew he’d failed. “That’s some next-level stalker shit, Stark. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were trying to get into my pants and all this –“ he said, waving a hand around the cave, “was just to impress me.” She raised her eyebrows at him and gave him a positively evil look.

                “Who says I’m not?” she said lightly. It disarmed him; put him on the back foot. He squinted at her and she giggled. “Carry on,” she prompted. “You were telling me off.”

                “So I was,” he said. Two could play this game. “You could have just asked me for my number on Saturday night. You could have just asked me if I was free, or even asked Beric for my number. And as impressed as I am by how fast you work, I’m still insulted that you thought you were important enough to just presume on my time.”

                “You could have said no,” she pointed out. He sighed.

                “I tried.”

                “No, you _lied._ ”

                “Which you’d never have known if you hadn’t somehow got hold of my work schedule. How’d you do it, anyway?”

                “Beric,” she said, flashing her teeth as she smiled. “He told me you always take the week after a fight off, in case your face needs time to heal.”

                “Oh.”

                “Did you imagine I’d sent goons to your office?” As that was exactly what he’d been imagining, he stayed silent and was rewarded again by that laugh. She moved closer, and his breath hitched.

 

For Gods’ sake, what was she doing to him? How was she doing this? They’d only met properly on Saturday night, here they were on Monday and both of them were flirting hard. Animal magnetism, he decided. They were two good-looking young people, they could flirt – and fuck – if they wanted to. Yes. He could fuck her; they could work out their sexual energy on each other, shake hands and be done with it. He would fuck her too, if she was up for it. He wanted to know how a highborn girl fucked. Would she be shy, or would she be wild? She was terrifyingly close.

                “How’s your lip?” she said, her voice husky.

                “Fine,” he choked out.

                “Good,” she whispered, her lips barely a breath from him. “Because it’s lunch time.”

He blinked as she stepped away, head spinning with the whiplash speed of the change. Her laugh reached him and he felt his brows go down in a frown. So she wanted to play? That was fine. He could play too. Over the lunch of simple sandwiches and boxed, cut fruit, he teased her with touches and murmurs. He brushed their fingers when she passed food or water to him and when he handed things back to her, he tucked a loose strand of her hair behind her ear and lingered on the jawline when he pulled his hand away. He sat so close their thighs pressed together; he reached towards her to brush a non-existent crumb from her lips. In reality, he merely rubbed his thumb over her lips. She let him too. He could feel her breath stutter slightly when he touched her. He could only hope it was all affecting her as much as it was affecting him. He pulled back a little after that, deliberately putting space between them before he gestured at the flares.

                “How long will they last?” he asked. He was pleased to note she took a deep breath before she answered him.

                “About forty-five minute life before they die out. We should switch our headlamps back on really.”

                “Do mine,” he instructed. “I don’t know how.” She took the bait too. He probably could have worked it out, but he wanted to know how far he might go, how much she would accept.

 

Her jacket was unzipped, he’d noticed it earlier. She knelt up to switch his lamp on, her body directly in front of his face. She had to know what she was doing, how she was sitting and what was at his direct eyelevel. He slid his hands inside the open edges of her jacket and put his hands onto her waist, over the shirt. He was astonished by the size of her, the narrowness of that waist combined with the solid strength he could feel. He wanted to peel that shirt off her and trail his lips over every line of muscle he had no doubt whatsoever existed on that stomach. She glanced down at him, but did not pull back. On the contrary, she smiled before she leant forward. He moved then, trailing his hand up her side. His palm slid over the curve of her breast, before he left her skin to move to the V of her shirt. He pulled it aside, exposing her wolf’s head tattoo. It was too dark, between the reddish light of the flare and the angle he sat at, to see much of the detailing, but really that wasn’t the point. He stared at it regardless, his fingers holding the shirt aside, his fingertips touching the very edge of the swell of her breast. As soon as his lamp came on, throwing the tattoo and his hands into sharp relief, he withdrew his touch, dropping her as if she burnt him. She swayed forward so minutely that had she not been the absolute centre of his focus, he would have missed it. He stood up abruptly. Her head was eyelevel with his cock, and she looked up at him, her eyes big in the twilight of the cave. That was a smash to the senses, that was. “I need to take a piss,” he announced bluntly. She swallowed.

                “Be – behind the pillar,” she murmured. “There’s a hole in the ground back there, it leads down to the river.”

 

He took his time, needing the break as much as he figured she did. There was something delicious about the way her voice had shaken then. His heart was knocking out a storm in his chest. He wanted to throw her down, rip those trousers off her and fuck her until the cavern rang with her screams and both of them were dizzy with pleasure. When he finally got himself under control and his heartbeat back to normal, he sauntered back round the column to find she was packing up the remains of the lunch, meticulously folding wrappers and slowly arranging them inside the box that had held the sandwiches. The flares were dying, the light dimmer than it had been.

                “We’d best be getting off,” she said, her voice now level again. “I haven’t got any more flares and the cavern is pitted with little holes. If you catch a foot in one of them, you’ll break an ankle or worse.” He agreed, and helped her be sure they’d taken all the rubbish away with them. He followed her back down the passage they’d come through and into the first, behind the waterfall. He was in for his second surprise. As the sun had moved around, it poured through the waterfall, creating a hundred rainbows all over the place as it sparkled and broke through the water. She reached up and switched her headlamp off, and he fumbled with his own until he found the switch. The light was dim, but enough to see by. She turned to him, her smile big and beautiful.          

                “Was it worth it?” she asked him, and he looked down at her.

                “Yeah, it was worth it,” he said, and she seemed to glow for a moment.

                “There’s a lot more to it,” she elaborated for him, gesturing round. “More passages, I mean, harder explorations to do – but you’ve never caved before and it’s already nearly three o’clock. You need the full day really. Maybe when I’m here next – in Kings Landing, I mean – we could do this again. Up at dawn, maybe camping out, the full lot.”

                “I’d like that,” he said. Not just the caving, he admitted to himself. The idea of seeing her again, that she wanted to see him again – that was good. And he liked the idea of camping with her.

 

When they’d emerged from behind the waterfall again, and were once more standing on open ground, she pulled her phone out. He watched her call in their safe exit, confirming that they had exited the cave and would not be going back in.

                “Why do you have to do that?” he asked. “Tell them you’re out, I mean?” They were on their way back up the narrow path, and she didn’t answer him immediately, choosing to wait until they were on level ground before she glanced back at him.

                “So if we don’t get back to Kings Landing because I wrap the bike around a tree, they know we aren’t still in the cave.” He squinted at her and she laughed, turning round to continue walking.

                “Don’t worry, I don’t plan to wrap the bike around a tree,” she said. “Not least because I’m not driving it.” He felt anticipation well up in his chest.

                “You mean –“

                “Yep. If you want to anyway,” she said. Her eyes were dancing with her amusement when she looked back at him, turning so she could walk backwards and still look at him. “Sorry I can’t throw you the keys in a B-movie cliché, but I gave them to Jory and he’ll have hidden them near the bike.” He rolled his eyes in a pseudo-dramatic huff.

                “What kind of half-assed offer is that, Stark? Can’t even throw me the keys.”

                “I’m sure you’ll think of a way I can make it up to you,” she threw back, her eyes glittering. She turned to walk the right way and tripped over a tree-root. She stumbled, but kept her footing, and he laughed. “Keep laughing,” she called over her shoulder. “Not only will you not ride the bike, but I’ll leave you here to walk.”


	10. Arya V

When they got back to the bike, Gendry was nearly dancing with impatience. Arya laughed at his eagerness, retrieving the keys from the rock Jory had hidden them under and unlocking the bike.

                “How did you know they were there?” he asked, and she waggled her phone at him.

                “Well, Gendry, there’s such a thing as a text message,” she said, and then laughed when he pulled a face at her. She held the keys at arm’s length, dangling them from a fingertip between them. Her mind was still whirling from what he’d done in the cave, what she’d done in the cave. They’d teased each other to nearly the brink; she’d been ready to kiss him, to _beg_ him. Thank the Gods he’d pulled back when he did, or she’d have fucked him on the floor with or without lights and to hell with the consequences. But once he was on that bike, and she had her hands on him – oh boy, would he pay for those stolen touches, for all that merciless teasing. He advanced, hand stretched out to take the keys when she pulled them back, touching them to her chest. “You do have a license, don’t you?” she queried.

                “Of course. I got one a few years ago. Beric used to let me ride his bike when he went away or didn’t need it.”

                “Excellent. Here,” she said, tossing the keys over. He caught them, just, and she picked her helmet off the handlebars. Jory had offered to take the helmets back with him, and then meet them back here, but she was glad now that she’d said no. She had to squash the rucksack fairly brutally to get it to go into the storage locker, but it was worth it for this privacy with Gendry.

                “Can I take you somewhere?” he asked suddenly. She stopped fiddling with the helmet strap and looked up. “Unless you have a curfew?”

                “Midnight,” she said, pulling the helmet on. “Like Cinderella. What did you have in mind?”

                “A surprise,” he said, pulling his own helmet on. “It’s my turn.” She agreed. She’d have agreed if he proposed they strip naked and do the chicken dance. She was dizzy with lust and happiness.

 

She sat behind him on the bike, wrapping her arms around him and settling down. Gods, he was solid. All muscle and sinew and firm skin. She deliberately pressed as close as she could, breasts pressing against his back. She kept her arms low, around his belly, hands splayed on his abdomen, fingers brushing his waistband. If it was the last thing she did tonight, she’d bring him to the same level of arousal that he’d reduced her to.

 

He drove them back to Kings Landing, but before they reached the walls of the city, he turned off, heading for a dirt track. At the end of it was a beach, a rough sandy cove she’d never seen before, that was completely empty and silent but for the calls of seabirds from high on the cliffs above them. He parked the bike before the sands, on the end of the rough gravel that lead to the beach itself. She swung her leg off the bike, standing and stretching out.

 

She smoothed her hair back when the helmet came off, bitterly aware that it was probably plastered to her skull in the shape of the helmet. The cave had been damper than she thought. She took the band holding it back out, ran her fingers through it to loosen the strands.

                “It’s beautiful,” she said, looking over her shoulder at Gendry. He was grinning, hands in his pockets, his own hair looking annoyingly perfect.

                “It’s not quite copper lines and quartz stalactites, but it’s pretty good,” he answered. “This is where I had my first bare-knuckle fight – scheduled, anyway. _The Staggered Pony_ was my first punch-up.”

                “You really know how to show a woman a good time,” she answered, grinning at him. “Going to show me the scars too?” He laughed.

                “The cave was where you found out what you wanted to do to feel free. This is where I found out what made me feel free.” She recognised it as a gesture, a way for him to feel equal with her. He was offering her a piece of himself as she had, however unintentionally, given him a piece of herself.

                “You didn’t have to do this,” she said, quietly.

                “I wanted to,” was all the answer she got.

 

She went down to where the sea lapped the sand, shucking her boots and socks. She peeled her trousers off, unbothered by what he’d think or do in response to her standing in her underwear. She wanted to paddle, to feel the waves tease her toes as she stood there. He was watching her and she knew it, as she bundled up socks and trousers, putting them and her boots beyond the water mark, standing neatly on a rock so she wouldn’t misplace them. As an afterthought, she left the jacket behind too. The sun was dipping towards the horizon, the light softening; although sunset itself was still a couple of hours away. She paddled, turning to him when she was ankle-deep in the water, the bigger waves kissing her knees.

                “Coming in?” she asked. He raised his eyebrows at her.

                “Isn’t it freezing?” he queried.

                “Scared?” she shot back. He kicked off boots and socks almost at once, rolling his jeans up to his knees. He waded in, hissing through his teeth at the chill. She smirked, turning back to watch the waves.

                “I hope you aren’t planning on swimming,” he said, his voice alarmingly close. She turned to find him right behind her, close enough to touch – close enough to kiss. “Because I’d be obliged, as a gentleman, to also swim so you wouldn’t drown. And if I do that, I think my balls might permanently retreat in protest.” She laughed aloud, the wind catching it and the birds calling a query back.

                “Well, we wouldn’t want that, would we?” she teased, turning fully to face him. She very much didn’t want that, she had plans, plans she was determined to see through. She adored the way they both seemed to be working on it, while she knew full well that if she closed the gap now, kissed his smile, he’d probably throw her down on the sands and fuck her senseless, cold water or no cold water. The game was probably as exciting as the unspoken promise that before midnight, they would have had each other.

                “No,” he agreed, looking down at her, his smirk wide. “We would not want that.” She turned back to the waves.

 

It was a long time before either of them spoke again, Arya trying to jump the bigger waves, Gendry hooting at her when she misjudged it. She was wet to the knickers when she eventually accepted that she could no longer feel her legs below the knee, and went to a convenient rock to dry in the sun. He followed, sitting down in front of her, leaning his head back against the rock, face level with her thigh.

                “I’m going back to Braavos on Wednesday,” she said, abruptly.

                “You said.”

                “I have a project to finish for my classes. I’m flying out at six am.” He pretended to wince.

                “Ouch.”

                “Lazy,” she said, scathingly. He just grinned at her, irritatingly unaffected. “I won’t be back until Christmas. Will you be in the city, over Christmas?”

                “It’s my home,” he said. “Of course I will. Wouldn’t you be in Winterfell, though?”

                “For Christmas itself, yes, but then we come down to spend the New Year at the Keep. Maybe you’d like to get a drink.” He nodded, eyes still closed against the glare of the sun. Whether he meant her to or not, she saw a small smile tug at his lips.

                “I’ve got the super-spy phone, right? You can keep in touch.” She beamed, grateful his eyes were closed. That was implicit permission to keep talking to him, even when she was back in Braavos and unable to see him in person. It was more than she’d hoped for. He turned his head suddenly, towards her legs, opening his eyes. One of his hands came up, and the fingertips traced the lines of the wreath of oak leaves and acorns she had tattooed around her thigh. A shock like fire ran through her from her toes to her head, leaving her skin fizzing underneath his touch. “This is beautiful work,” he said, his voice low. “Braavos?”

                “Yes,” she said, her voice as quiet as his. “I’ve had it a year now.”

                “You’ve got a lot of tattoos for someone who’s only just legally allowed them,” he pointed out.

                “You only have to be sixteen in Braavos,” she said with a little smile. She brought her other leg up so she could rest her cheek on her knee. His hand moved, and he wrapped his hand around her thigh, moving himself so he could push her leg towards him, opening her up to him. He trailed his fingertips round the wreath, skating over her inner thigh. There was no mistaking the intimacy, the sexually charged nature of the gesture. She was going to start begging in a minute, pride be damned. His head was bent, close enough to trace the path of his fingers with his mouth. She found herself wishing he would.

                “Are you dry enough to get dressed?” he murmured. His breath was hot on her skin.

                “Yes,” she said. She would have said yes if she was dripping wet from head to foot.

                “Get your clothes on,” he said. There was a command in his voice. Desperate to reclaim some of the power, she put her hand down. She forced his face up, fingers gripping his chin.

                “Why?” she said.

                “Because, Stark, I am going to drive us back to my flat. I’m going to strip you off, kiss each and every one of your tattoos, trace every line of you with my hands,” he promised, his fingers caressing the wreath in imitation of that promise, “and then trace every line of you with my mouth.” He bent his head, her hand offering no resistance, and pressed a kiss to the acorn that adorned her inner thigh. She physically jumped under it. “I’m going to bury my face between your thighs and lick your cunt until you jump like that again and again. And then, Stark, I am going to fuck you. Is that agreeable?”

                “Yes,” she breathed.

 

He launched to his feet, pulling her off the rock roughly. His arms were around her, he was kissing her, and she couldn’t bloody breathe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm baaaaack.
> 
> Normal schedule of every other day will now resume :)


	11. Gendry VI

He’d have considered it a loss of points, that he’d cracked first, except that kissing her was like drinking sunshine. It lit him up from head to foot as he crushed her against him, her arms winding eagerly around his neck as she kissed him back.

 

He’d damn near come in his jeans when she’d started stripping off and paddling, of all things. The green leaves and golden acorns adorning her thigh were vivid, shifting with her muscles as if they were in a breeze. The black cotton of her underwear hugged her close, giving him a great view as she skipped and jumped, trying to jump the waves and failing. When she’d eventually left the water, and spread herself on the rock to dry out in the sun, he’d felt his mouth water at the picture she presented. The safer, wiser, less reckless thing to do would have been to sit beside her, or behind her, or on the other side of the beach altogether. Instead he’d sat down on the sand in front of the rock, resting his head back, so close to her that had he turned his head, he would have been able to rest his cheek against the oak leaves. When she told him that she was leaving on Wednesday, his mood had fallen significantly, and he’d closed his eyes to try and control his face. Then she’d asked

him for a drink – like a _date_. He had wondered about calling her on it, asking for clarification, then decided no, if it was a date, it was a date. That would become clear at New Year, when she was back in the city. If not, then he would still get to hang with her and Gods knew she was fun. It was like being next to a battery pack, or a ball of fire – she was humming with energy. As they agreed without saying it to keep in touch, he turned his head to the side, bringing his hand up to touch the tattoo around her thigh. She hadn’t moved, hadn’t even tensed when he touched her. She’d just sat, implicit acceptance, welcoming of his touch on her skin.

 

He might have to take a little holiday to Braavos, if the tattoos were this good – although he dreaded to think about how much it must have cost her. He was the one who upped the game, moving them both, moving her leg outwards so he could see the wreath – ostensibly, anyway. In reality, he was merely closing the gap. He wanted her. She wanted him, he could hear it in her shaky breaths and her talk about meeting again. He was going to have her. He wanted to touch his mouth to those leaves, to taste the salt of the sea that would still be clinging to her skin.             

                “Are you dry enough to get dressed?” he murmured. He breathed out, low and gentle, feeling like he was losing control of this situation.

                “Yes,” she answered him, her own voice husky. He could tell she was – he’d just had his hands on her. But he wanted to see what she’d say.

                “Get your clothes on,” he said. There was a command in his voice. She breathed in, long and deep, he heard it. Her hand shifted, he saw it in his peripheral vision, even as he never stopped running his fingers over the wreath. She forced his face up, fingers gripping his chin and he looked at her. Her eyes were dark with lust; her lips were parted as she breathed roughly.

                “Why?” she asked him, although she knew, she must have known why. He indulged her anyway because that way at least, it would be out in the open. Even if somehow he had terribly misread all of the signs thus far, she would have the chance to consent or not.

                “Because, Stark, I am going to drive us back to my flat. I’m going to strip you off, kiss each and every one of your tattoos, trace every line of you with my hands,” he promised, his fingers caressing the wreath, so she was in no doubt at all about what he meant, “and then trace every line of you with my mouth.” Despite her fingers still on his chin, he bent his head pressed a kiss to the acorn that adorned her inner thigh. She physically jumped under it and he let his lips curve against her skin, letting her feel his smile. “I’m going to bury my face between your thighs and lick your cunt until you jump like that again and again. And then, Stark, I am going to fuck you. Is that agreeable?”

                “Yes,” she breathed.

 

He was on his feet immediately, so fast he damn near stumbled. He covered it by pulling her off the rock, into his arms. He kissed her, no pretence or tricks about it this time, just his lips on hers. She kissed him back, her enthusiasm matching his as she pressed herself into his arms. He dragged her close, heedless of how uncomfortable the position was for him. Gods she was small. He had very little time, and he knew it. He ripped himself away from her, turning his back to walk back to the bike.

                “Get dressed,” he tossed over his shoulder.

 

His boots were barely laced before she was back beside him, her eyes sparkling. He had to be impressed – leather trousers couldn’t be easy to get on over salt-stained skin. But there she was, smiling at him. He got on the bike, and she did too, once more pressing herself into his back, her hands dangerously close to his belt. He drove them back to his flat, thanking the Gods that she had the sense not to grab his cock mid-ride. He would have smashed it into a tree. His impatience while she fumbled with the locks for the bike knew no bounds but he knew that rushing her would only make her fumble more. He secretly loved how he’d cracked her control enough to make her hands shake. His own hands shook on his keys, before he got her inside. He vaguely registered the thumps of her dropping the helmets on the floor. He pulled her up the stairs by the hand, bypassing his living room completely, although he’d had vague thoughts about maybe offering her a drink and at least doing the thing semi-respectably. He took her straight into his bedroom, and there, for a moment, they just stood there, staring at each other.

 

For a moment, he was afraid that the break had ruined the mood, that the moment had been lost. She made the first move though, and suddenly his arms were full of her and she was kissing him fiercely. He took her by the biceps, dragging her into him, his mouth plundering hers. His hands found the zipper of her jacket, yanking it down so he could push it off her. Her hands were mirroring the action, and more, dragging his shirt off him, over his head so he had to stop kissing her. In his insistence that that would not occur again, his method of removing her t-shirt was to seize in his fists and rip it. She gave a gasp at the action, but didn’t stop to yell at him. He shoved the tattered remains off her shoulders, sliding his hands over her bare back and dragging her closer, breasts pressed into his chest. Her bra was the same black cotton as her knickers had been on the beach. He turned them round, pushing her backwards until they found the bed, falling onto it together. His hands fumbled, finding the catch of her bra and flinging it aside, not knowing or caring where it landed. She was bare to him now, from the waist up at least, and he manipulated them round so he could lay her down on the pillows, cursing how flat they were. For now, at least, he wanted to slow this down. He knelt over her, staring down at her face. Her lips were swollen by his kisses, her cheeks painted pink. He moved then, starting his kiss at her face while his hands stroked her stomach, arms, ribs, always deliberately avoiding her breasts. He followed the path with his mouth, exactly as he’d promised her on the beach. His hands found the buttons of her trousers, undoing them slowly, one by one. When he had them open enough, he started yanking them down her legs, even as he nipped and kissed the skin on her belly.

 

She was soft and warm and responsive as she squirmed beneath him, her hands tangling themselves in his hair. When he’d brought her trousers to her knees, he made the discovery that she wasn’t wearing underwear. He looked up at her quizzically, and she raised her head to see what he’d seen. She smirked at him.

                “They were still wet, so I took them off,” she said.

                “Where are they?” he asked.

                “In your jacket pocket,” she answered. He grinned, he couldn’t help it. He took her trousers off the rest of the way. As well as the wolf on her chest and the wreath around her thigh, he could see something dark creeping over her shoulders, a nymph on her right arm, an intricate star on her left shoulder where it curved down to her arm. There was a complex and detailed design beneath her breasts too, making a pendant that hung down. He examined it closely, noticing that the circle it ended in had another wolf in it, much smaller and more stylised. And finally, finally, he turned his attention to her breasts. He trailed his fingertips along her collar bone, sliding down and with a single fingertip, he trailed over her breasts. She jumped again, and he laughed at her, lowering his head.

                “You’re a responsive thing,” he said, licking a slow stripe up her sternum, nipping her collarbone when he got there. She gasped.

 

He took his time with her, fulfilling his promise to trace every line of her. By the time he reached her cunt, she was trembling, gasps and profanity spilling from her lips. He reached up to kiss her, and her hands tangled into his hair with an energy that bordered on violence. She was kissing him desperately. He had to tear himself away, drop his forehead to the pillow beside her for a minute. She hadn’t even touched him yet and he was rock hard, pressing uncomfortably into the jeans he still wore.

                “Gendry,” she whined, and he grinned into her shoulder.

                “What do you need?” he whispered, his voice ragged. “Tell me.”

                “You,” she panted.

                “Mouth or hands?”

                “Both, either, I don’t _care_ you fucking bastard, just touch me!”

                “Bossy,” he reproved. Before she could say anything else, he slid downwards anyway, pushing her legs apart so he could look at her. She was wet already, her lips glistening with it. He ran a finger down her folds, and her hips snapped up.

                “Gendry!”

                “This what you were wanting?” he enquired, continuing his action. She ground down on his finger, seeking more friction. He pressed her hips into the bed with a hand to her stomach and dropped his mouth to her. She cried out, a sharp cry that sounded like music to his ears. He feasted on her, sliding two fingers of his free hand into her tight heat, fucking her slowly and languorously with them, finding out where the spots were that made her whine and squirm and shake. He could feel her slick coating his chin, knowing she’d taste herself on his lips if he kissed her. She was pressing her hips down. “Tell me what you need,” he commanded, raising his head for a moment.

                “Faster,” she growled. “Fuck me faster.” He obeyed, lowering his mouth back to her cunt and resuming his ministrations. Slowly, probably slower than she wanted, he picked up the pace.

 

He felt her approach the edge before she made a sound. There was an increased burst of slick wet from her, a tightening, and then her hips arched up.

                “Gendry! Fuck!” She exploded round his fingers and hidden from her sight, his eyes widened as his palm suddenly flooded with wet. He looked up at her, and saw a wonderful sight. Her eyes were screwed shut, her mouth open as she gasped for air. There was a scarlet blush on her cheeks. “Sorry,” she gasped, coming back down. “I – I – sorry.“

                “Apologise to me again, Stark, and I’ll keep you here well past midnight because I’ll make you do that over and over again until you learn that it’s the hottest fucking thing I’ve ever seen.” She choked on a laugh, her blush intensifying. She sat up then, pulling his face to hers. “Can you taste it?” he whispered when she let him go. She bit her lip and nodded. “Good. Because it’s amazing.”

                “Take your jeans off,” she muttered, her hands scrabbling at his belt. He helped her, and she pushed him down onto the pillow this time. He could see the wet patch if he turned his head, pride making him swell again with renewed energy. He’d done that to her. He’d brought that arousal out of her and reduced her to a quivering mess. She crawled down his body, and when she put her hands onto his hips he could still feel the tremor.

 

Her mouth was warm and wet, her tongue a gentle caress as she licked a long, slow stripe from base to tip. Her eyes were shadowed with lust as she looked up at him, taking him into her mouth. She didn’t try and take all of him, working with her hands what she couldn’t cover with her mouth, dropping one to massage his balls. He bucked into her mouth. She looked up then, coming off him with a pop. She smirked up at him, and suddenly the hand on his balls dropped lower, massaging his perineum with two finger tips. He bucked, a grunt tearing out of him. She dropped her head again, her free hand tugging his cock as her mouth traced a path over him, balls and shaft, teasing the skin between foreskin and head.

                “Stop,” he gasped, through gritted teeth. “Come here.” He pulled her up, and she straddled him, her cunt sliding over his cock, grinding it between her slick lips and his belly. He grabbed her hips, stilling her, his teeth gritted as he fought a battle of self-control. She reached back, gripped the base of his cock nearly hard enough to hurt.

                “For the love of God, tell me you’ve got a condom,” she said, her voice harsh with desperation. He gestured at the bedside table.

                “Top drawer.”

 

Her fingers fumbled with the foil, rolling the latex down his shaft. She stayed over him.

                “This work for you?” she demanded, hovering over his shaft. He said yes. He would have said yes if she’d suggested they fuck hanging upside down. She sank down onto him and he watched her eyes roll back. He thought his might have as well. He seized her hips, moving her at once, even as she shook above him. She took over then, pinning his hands to the mattress before pressing her hands onto his chest and moving. She dragged herself up and held herself over him, only the very head of his cock inside her heat, before she sheathed herself fully. She fucked him long and slow until all he could see was the bounce of her breasts and the movement of her wolf’s head as she panted. He let her torture him, the slide and slip and the sound of her breaths.

 

He took her in his arms then, flipped them both. She was staring at him. He slid inside her again, and this time he set the pace. He fucked her fast because he could feel the edge coming and he wanted her falling with him.

                “Touch yourself,” he ordered her, pushing himself up so she could. She was shaking when she reached down between them and he felt her knuckles against him as she worked her clit over where his cock drove into her, relentless and hard and desperate. He could feel her tightening and clutching and she screamed aloud when she came, a wordless, violent scream. He collapsed, dragging her shoulders up so he could hold her,    his legs shaking as he came.

 

He came round enough to roll off her so he didn’t crush her to death beneath him. He got rid of the condom and fell beside her, panting harshly. Her breathing matched his and he noticed she made no effort to cover herself up or hide her nakedness. Gods, that confidence was sexy. Gods he wanted a cigarette.

                “That was amazing,” she mumbled from beside him. “What time is it?” He glanced at his alarm clock.

                “Nine.”

                “Oh good. I can regain some feeling in my legs.” He grinned up at his ceiling, felt a light slap on his shoulder. “Don't get cocky.”

                “Hard not to when you're being so honest. Don't worry Stark, I'm assured it isn't permanent.”

                “Fuck off.”

                “Do you smoke?” he enquired.

                “Oh Gods, you've got cigarettes too? Yes, please.” The pack was in his trouser pocket, he had to lean over her to get at them. A sharp spank landed on his arse and he looked back to find her grinning at him. “You've got an amazing arse,” she said. He just shook his head at her, pushing his window open and waving the pack at her.

                “You want one, you're going to have to sit by the window.” She groaned but sat up anyway, wriggling over to join him. She still did not demure about her nudity, made no indication that she wanted a shirt to replace the one he had ruined. He supposed he might feel guilty if he didn't know she could easily replace it.

 

They smoked in companiable silence, her hair stirring in the breeze stealing through his open window.It was nice sitting with her. She was wild, free, something completely new. And he definitely wanted her. Again. Possibly more than once. She was beautiful in the streetlight pouring through his open window.

                “Do you ever miss home?” he asked her abruptly. She shrugged.

                “Sometimes. But I got a good life out there, you know? Largely anonymous too. The school know who I really am, but nobody else.”

                “So you're just – normal?” She laughed.

                “Pretty much. Just plain ol' Arya.”

                “You're pretty weird, Stark, you know?”

                “I know.” He stubbed out the cigarette, eyed her naked body appreciatively.

                “Fancy a shower?”

 


	12. Arya VI

He brought her to orgasm _twice_ in the bloody shower. She'd had to sit down. He'd looked annoyingly smug about it too. Bastard. So, of course, she'd just _had_ to pull out every damn trick she'd had, just to wipe that annoying grin off his bloody face.

 

Not that she had _minded._

 

His cock was fucking beautiful. Hell, all of him was. She had to ask where he got his tattoos done. The raven on his ribs, the bull's head half sleeve, the three flying ravens across his shoulders, some beautiful tribal design across his left hip. Gorgeous. And there were the muscles too. And the height. And those beautiful blue eyes and the short hair – and oh fuck, he was just generally _stunning_.

 

He'd even washed her back for her – although when his hands started running over the lines of her biggest piece, she had suspected his motives.

                “So this is why they call you Faceless?”

                “Yeah,” she said, standing still under his hands. “What do you think of it?”

                “It's - it's kind of – sad. Like - there's the Nymph, and she's standing in a garden, and first glance, hey, that's great, you know? But then I look again, and she has no face at all, and she's not _standing_ in the garden, she's being _swallowed_ by it. The roses are growing up her legs, and the vines are wrapping around her waist, and the – are they honeysuckles? - they're twined around her arms.” His hands went to her shoulders, pulled her back against him. “Did you design it?” he asked softly, water running down them like rain.

                “Yeah. Drew it myself.”

                “It's beautiful,” he murmured.

 

It wasn't fair how _brilliant_ he was. And OK, yeah, he could be a bit of a jerk – he could do with getting rid of that weird chip on his shoulder about her stupid-ass title – and boy, could he be _rude_ , but he was also funny, kind of sweet, charming when he fancied it, pretty sharp when he paused – yeah, he was pretty good.

                “Text me,” he said, pressing her against his front door, kissing her senseless. “From your little Braavosi rental.” He listened too.

                “Might do,” she said, trying to sound casual even as she slid her hands onto his amazing arse.

                “Orgasms don't count for much, huh?”

                “Fuck off, Waters.”

                “You fuck off, it's my flat.”

                “I'm _trying_ ,” she pointed out. “You've got me pressed up against your front door like a cave-man.”

                “Careful, or I'll go full cave-man and drag you back to my lair.” But he let go of her waist, now decently hidden by one of his shirts, and stepped back.

 

She slipped out, fired the bike, felt it move. She did _not_ feel like she was moving. Her head was miles back, still in bed with him, feeling his rough palms on her skin and his lips – surprisingly soft – on hers. It was five to midnight when she got back to the Keep, having left the bike parked on a street just below it. It would be perfectly safe there. She had meant to leave in enough time to take it back to its garage and then walk but – well, fuck that in the face of Gendry Waters.

 

She knocked softly on her sister's door, heard soft footsteps before Sansa answered.

                “You're back,” Sansa said, letting her slip inside.

                “No shit.” Sansa eyed her, smiled knowingly as Arya flopped onto Sansa's bed.

                “Good day?” Sansa queried, sitting down beside her prone form.

                “Pretty fucking _amazing._ ”

                “What was his name?” Arya tried to look innocent.

                “Whose name?”

                “The name of the gentleman who gave you _that_ ,” her sister answered, gesturing at her neck. Arya cursed, jumped up. It was already bruising, for fuck's sake. She hadn't even noticed him doing it. Twat. “I can give you some _really good_ concealer in the morning,” Sansa offered, smirking.

                “After I've had him murdered.” She fell back onto Sansa's bed with a groan. “And I'll accept the concealer if you can put it on for me. I'll probably fuck it up.”

                “Only if you tell me every single filthy, salacious detail.”

                “His name is Gendry Waters – and do _not_ have Baelish check up on him, he's perfectly nice –and he's a bare knuckle boxer.”

                “A bare-knuckle boxer? Heavens.”

                “Shut up. He's – so down to earth, you know? Couldn't care less about the title -"

                “Wait, he _knows_ who you are? Arya!”

                “Turns out I met him _ages_ ago. Remember when we went to Harrenhal? We met there. Don't worry Sans, you'll go grey. Look, if it makes you feel better, I'll text him.” She did so, ignoring Sansa's eyebrows climbing ever higher on her head.

                “He's got your number too? Arya, that's so reckless -"

                “Gods, Sans, I'm not stupid. He's got an encrypted phone with my number in it. No way for him to access it.”

                “I know you aren't stupid but Arya, I – _Ramsey._ ” Her sister was biting her lip, fear in her blue eyes. Arya's chest still went tight with rage when she thought about that fucker.

                “Sans -"

                “I gave my number to someone once, someone I thought I could trust and then I ended up –“

                “Sansa! Ramsey was _not_ your fault. He was a fucking psychopath. He would have done what he did regardless -"

                “I know, I know. I know, therapy – therapy helped me see all that but I just -"

                “You panic. I know.” Sansa shifted, lay down beside her, her head next to Arya's.

                “So – Gendry, huh?” Arya recognised the closing of their tangent.

                “He's kind of cool. Likes leather jackets too, got tattoos, _hates_ the aristocracy, wicked sense of humour, kind of rude to me – and _gorgeous._ Like ridiculously gorgeous.”

                “Urgh, where do you find them? I want a gorgeous young thing too.”

                “Stop hanging around with Baelish then. He frightens them off.”

                “Oh, stop it. So – was he _good?_ ”

                “So good. And you know how some guys are really good with their hands maybe, but then the actual dick comes into play and it's like you've got an asthmatic fish on top of you?” Sansa shrieked with laughter.

                “ _What_ a description, Arya, my Gods. But yes, as it happens.”

                “He's got the whole package down.” Sansa gave her a little shove.

                “I _hate_ you sometimes. Go on, get back to your own room.” Arya grinned, standing up and ambling over to the door.

                “So _touchy_ – and you were the one who asked for details. Oh, by the way, do you know what the plan is for tomorrow?” Sansa nodded.

                “Mother wants us to go with her to the Sept and then have family time here.”

                “Grim. I'll take a hoodie.”

                “She won't like it.”

                “And _I_ don't like having my photo taken.”

 

She made it to her room unseen, pulled her phone out of her jacket pocket to find a message from Gendry. She grinned, opening the messaging app.

 

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Hey, I know it goes without saying, but please don't tell anyone you fucked Lady Stark. I mean, tell everyone you fucked me if you like, I don't give a shit, but just not the title part. My sister's having a coronary about it._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: So I should rescind the press release?_

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: I'm not a moron, doll. And I tend NOT to kiss and tell. Tell your sister to chill._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Thanks. Oh and by the way, thanks for the massive hickey, idiot._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: File it next to the scratches down my back and shoulders. Cut your damn nails._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Bite me._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: Already did. You were delicious._

She laughed, tossed the phone down onto her bed while she changed into her pyjamas. She folded his shirt neatly into a drawer before she snuggled into bed, picking her phone up to keep talking to him.

 

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: You weren't bad yourself. Hey, do you want me to post that shirt back to you?_

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: No. Keep it. You can give it back to me next time._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Christmas. Keep in touch, Bull._

_TO: ARYA_

_FROM: GENDRY: I will, Faceless. Night._

_TO: GENDRY_

_FROM: ARYA: Night._

The next day was, from start to finish, one long argument. Arya insisted on the hoodie, hid her face from the photographers who apparently had _nothing_ better to do than follow her sister around. As cameras of all kinds were blanket-banned inside the Sept itself, she took off the hoodie once they were inside with the massive door closed behind them, but apparently this wasn't enough for Catelyn, who thought even the _suggestion_ of a hoodie anywhere near the Sept was bordering on profane, if not outright blasphemy.

 

Arya had always disliked Septs. They felt cold to her, the statutes looming and somehow menacing. She preferred the Old Gods of her father's faith, the peace found in the Godswood, the nameless, faceless Gods without specific identity. She did not _object_ to the Faith of the Seven – like all her siblings, she had attended both the Sept and the Godswood as a child, had found aspects of both faiths she liked. She just didn't like the Septs themselves. Still, she was always respectful, always polite, always on her best behaviour inside them, would attend if asked – she just _wished_ that her mother would make some effort to _understand._

 

She knew she baffled Catelyn sometimes, knew that her mother would compare her to Sansa and wonder how her daughters could be such polar opposites. When she had been younger, she had resented Sansa fiercely for it, wrongly assuming her sister revelled in being _the good sister_ against her own wildness. When she'd grown up a bit – after she'd gone away – she had seen it a little clearer. Sansa hadn't liked it either. She'd mistaken her sister's embarrassed glances for gloats, her timid offers of sewing lessons as bragging. She had made it up with Sansa over wine and tears after Ramsey.

 

Her relationship with her mother though –Arya had long ago accepted that she and Catelyn would never see eye-to-eye. They were coolly caring, but that was as good as it got.

 

She found herself where she always did here – standing at the feet of the Stranger, craning her neck to look up at his shadowed face. Unlike the Sept at home, the Stranger here faced the centre of the room instead of the wall – although the sculptor had carved his cowl so deep, whatever his face looked like was always concealed in shadow. Arya always quite liked the Stranger. _The God for outcasts and the dead,_ Sansa had once commented. _I see the attraction._

 

Finally, Catelyn summoned her, rolled her eyes when the hoodie went back on, and they stepped back out into daylight. The photographers had gone elsewhere, obviously having found bigger fish to fry, and Sandor was parked at the foot of the steps, waiting in the idling car. He caught her eye in the rear-view mirror, and she pulled a face in answer to his silent question.

 

“Family time" had turned into _nag Arya about her life_ time, and while her father had managed to deflect a lot of it, questions like _When are you going to grow up and come home_ and _Don't slouch like that, working with those filthy engines is ruining your posture, shouldn't you take some deportment lessons_ and _why are you so sullen_ still managed to land and sting. By the time dinner rolled around, she was so desperate for a cigarette that her hands were shaking when she tried to cut her meat.

 

She scrabbled around in her room, found the empty pack and threw it in frustration. It did not help. Empty cigarette packets hardly bounced, let alone landed with a satisfying thud. A knock sounded at the door.

                “Fuck off!” she bellowed, without stopping to think. The door opened and her father came in, frowning slightly.

                “You know I don't like hearing you curse like that.” She dragged a shaking hand through her hair and exhaled long.

                “Sorry.”

                “We'll say no more then.” He felt in a pocket, threw her something. She caught it and examined it. Ten pack of cigarettes. She glanced at him, biting her lip guiltily. She hadn't known he knew. “I’ve known for about six months now. I can hear you exhaling on the phone sometimes.” He didn't seem angry.

                “Then do you mind if I -"

                “Not at all – on the balcony, Arya.” She slid open the door, stepped out and lit up. Her father followed her. “I can't say I exactly approve, of course, but at the same time I prefer you do this than strangle someone, which I was starting to worry was the alternative.”

                “We were headed in that direction,” she muttered. “I just – I just want her to understand me a little more.”

                “I know, Arya. I am going to have a talk with her, OK?”

                “Knock yourself out, it won't change. Let's just move on. Sansa asked me if I could make it back for her 21st birthday.”

                “Can you?”

                “Unless I have an exam on that afternoon, I should be able to. She's having it here instead of at home, isn't she?”

                “It's a formal affair. Tuxes and evening gowns - she's planning it as her official presentation to Court as well as her birthday.” Arya nodded.

                “I'll get a dress and everything made. Look here, I was thinking of surprising her though – you know, telling her I can't make it then rocking up anyway. Would that steal her thunder, do you think?” Her father smiled at her.

                “No, and I'm sure she'd love it. Do you want to sneak out tonight?” She glanced at her watch, sighed.

                “Best not. Pod promised he'd drive me to the airport in the morning and he's picking me up at four for the six-thirty flight. You don't mind me stealing him, do you?”

                “Not at all, he cleared it with me days ago. I'm sorry I can't take you myself.” That got a smile from her.

                “Dad, you've taken me – and picked me up – every single other time, basic probability said that eventually, you'd miss _one_.” He smiled too.

                “I have to head back North even before you do –so I'll say goodbye now. Have a good time, study hard, try and call – and be safe.”

                “I will Dad.” His smile grew a little.

                “Come on, you aren't too big to give your Dad a hug.” She grinned. Stubbing out the cigarette, she threw her arms around him and squeezed. He gave the _best_ hugs.

                “Bye Dad,” she whispered. “I'll miss you. Give Jon and Robb my love, you'll see them before me.”

                “I will. Love you.”

                “Love you too, Dad.”

 

He stroked her hair for a moment, then slipped out. She smoked another cigarette, staring out over the city. She could see the Blackwater from up here.

 

She wondered if Gendry could see it too.


End file.
